[E  LIBRARY 
OF 

iRSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 
LOS  ANGELfe 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

BY 
FRANCES  LESTER  WARNER 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 

HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

<Xbt  ftitoersibe  prc«*  Cambridge 


COPYRIGHT,   1919,  BY  FRANCES   LESTER  WARNER 

ALL  RIGHTS  RESERVED  INCLUDING  THE  RIGHT  TO  REPRODUCE 
THIS  BOOK  OR  PARTS  THEREOF  IN  ANY  FORM 


To  my  father 
the  Endicott  of  these  papers 

and  to  my  mother 

whose  role  as  narrator  I  have  ventured 
to  assume 


NOTE 

Acknowledgment  of  permission  to  reprint  cer 
tain  of  these  papers  is  made  to  the  editors  of 
The  Atlantic  Monthly,  The  Century,  The  Con- 
gregationalist,  The  New  Country  Life,  The 
Mount  Holyoke  College  Monthly,  Scribner's 
Magazine,  and  The  Unpopular  Review. 


CONTENTS 

I.  ENDICOTT  AND  I  CONDUCT  AN  OR 
CHESTRA  1 
II.  ENDICOTT  AND  I  Go  SKETCHING  18 

III.  ENDICOTT  AND  I  CONDUCT  FAMILY 

PRAYERS  36 

IV.  THE  FLOOR  51 
V.  RETRIEVING  THE  AIREDALE  61 

VI.  ENDICOTT  AND  I  REDUCE  72 

VII.  THE  AMATEUR  CHESSMAN  88 

VIII.  ENDICOTT  AND  I  Go  FISHING  101 
IX.  CECROPIA     MOTH     AND     OTHER 

STUDIES  117 

X.  ENDICOTT  AND  I  ECONOMIZE  138 

XI.  DAR'STTHOU,  CASSIUS?  160 

XII.  BARBARA  DEVELOPS  THE  LAND  173 

XIII.  DRIFTWOOD  FIRE  187 

XIV.  How  WILL  You  HAVE  YOUR  PAY?  197 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 


I 

ENDICOTT  AND  I  CONDUCT 
AN  ORCHESTRA 


HEN  two  people  conduct 
an  orchestra,  there  is  plot 
material.  If  the  two  are 
knit  by  marriage  ties,  the 
plot  thickens.  Endicott  and  I  con 
duct  a  family  orchestra,  he  at  the 
piano,  I  playing  second  violin.  I 
know  more  about  music  than  does 
Endicott;  he  is  more  musical  than  I. 
I  keep  the  time;  he  has  the  tempera 
ment.  Temperament  is  more  noble 
than  time,  but  time,  I  shall  always 
insist,  has  its  place,  perhaps  nowhere 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

more  appropriately  than  in  an  orches 
tra.  He,  at  the  piano,  can  dominate 
the  situation  more  neatly  than  I.  In 
my  position  among  the  strings,  how 
ever,  I  can  more  readily  organize  a 
strike. 

The  rest  of  the  "pieces"  are  pre 
sided  over  by  our  children,  young 
people  of  inflexible  spirit  and  chro 
matic  moods.  Sometimes  we  doubt 
whether  we  have  our  troupe  under 
the  rigid  control  which,  as  parents, 
we  might  expect  to  command.  The 
conductivity  of  an  orchestra,  says 
our  son  Geoffrey,  varies  with  the 
distance  of  the  blood-relationship  be 
tween  artists  and  conductor.  When 
the  children  were  little,  we  held  the 
pleasant  theory  that  a  family  orches 
tra  would  draw  us  all  close  together, 
2 


WE  CONDUCT  AN  ORCHESTRA 

standing  always  as  a  symbol  of  our 
perfect  harmony.  That  would  be  all 
right  if  the  harmony  would  only  go 
to  suit  us  all  equally  at  the  same 
time.  As  it  is,  our  little  band,  in 
which  observers  find  so  touching  a 
picture  of  hearthside  unity,  suggests 
sometimes  all  the  elements  of  guerrilla 
warfare. 

The  question  most  likely  to  strain 
diplomatic  relations  is  the  choice  of 
what  to  play.  This  is  complicated  by 
the  fact  that  we  each  judge  music 
by  a  different  norm.  Geoffrey,  for  in 
stance,  begs  us  not  to  play  anything 
where  the  cornet  has  to  rest  too  much. 
He  says  that  he  cannot  keep  track 
of  a  rest  of  more  than  forty-seven 
measures  and  be  absolutely  sure  of 
coming  in  again  at  the  right  place. 
3 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

Every  one  admits  that  it  is  unfortu 
nate  when  Geoffrey  comes  in  at  the 
wrong  place.  There  is  no  smoothing 
over  the  astonishing  effect  of  his  pre 
mature  trumpeting.  "You  cannot," 
says  Geoffrey,  "do  the  dumb  shuffle 
on  the  cornet."  For  his  sake,  there 
fore,  in  looking  over  new  music,  we 
examine  the  cornet  part  for  rests  be 
fore  we  buy. 

Endicott,  a  quorum  in  himself, 
agrees  to  anything  except  five  sharps. 
Once  seated  upon  the  long  piano 
bench,  he  is  the  genial  patriarch  at 
home.  The  girls,  gracefully  in  league, 
object  to  extremes  of  any  kind.  They 
are  our  star  performers,  and  must  be 
humored  at  any  cost.  Knowing  that 
the  first  violin  and  the  'cello  are  too 
valuable  for  us  to  lose,  they  exercise 

4 


WE  CONDUCT  AN  ORCHESTRA 

a  cool  and  shameless  power  of  veto 
at  every  turn. 

I  myself  admire  extremes.  My 
tastes  are  catholic,  and  my  choices 
range  all  the  way  from  the  "Unfin 
ished  Symphony"  to  "The  Swing," 
by  Sudds.  The  one  thing  in  all  the 
world  that  I  really  will  not  play  is 
Schumann's  "Warum,"  a  favorite 
with  the  first  violin.  This  worthy 
composition  leaves  me  undone  for 
days.  Its  insane,  insistent  question 
slides  through  my  mind,  over  and 
over.  I  will  not  play  it.  I  will  not 
think  about  it.  I  will  not  even  explain 
my  antipathy.  I  have  hidden  the 
music. 

Probably  the  assembling  of  an 
orchestra  is,  to  the  audience,  a  con 
ventional  and  colorless  affair  enough. 
5 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

Any  players  of  chamber  music,  how 
ever,  who  have  been  confined  to  a 
space  that  housed  as  many  other 
things  as  does  our  living-room,  know 
better.  After  bringing  in  enough  din 
ing-room  chairs  to  seat  the  players, 
and  adjusting  the  cross-legged  music- 
stands,  we  find  ourselves  a  little  short 
of  room.  We  have  as  yet  been  unable 
to  find  a  type  of  music-stand  which 
will  not  trip  up  long-limbed  cornet- 
ists  off  their  guard.  One  evening  when 
Geoffrey,  threading  his  way  to  his 
seat,  really  did  lose  his  balance,  and 
plunged  headlong  into  my  work- 
basket,  one  foot  in  the  fireplace  and 
the  other  still  entangled  in  Barbara's 
music-stand,  affairs  rose  to  a  climax. 
"Everybody  more  than  a  mile  high 
please  leave  the  room,"  said  Barbara, 
6 


WE  CONDUCT  AN  ORCHESTRA 

leaning  over  her  'cello  and  unweaving 
the  legs  of  the  stand  from  among  her 
brother's  feet.  Any  quotation  from 
"Alice  in  Wonderland"  is  always 
calculated  to  infuriate  the  men  of  our 
family,  and  Endicott  turned  at  once 
to  his  son's  support. 

"I  don't  see,"  said  Endicott,  "why 
Barbara  doesn't  arrange  some  little 
device  for  her  music,  just  as  Mar 
garet  does.  Those  tin  spider-legs  are 
really  dangerous." 

Margaret's  "device"  is  at  least  not 
dangerous.  She  always  pins  her  music 
to  the  tomato  pin-cushion  on  the 
mantel,  and  stands  aloof,  compactly. 

Once  comfortably  settled,  we  tune. 

That  is  one  thing  that  we  all  will 

do.    Ever  since  the  children  began 

to  learn,  when  even  the  baby  would 

7 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

bring  his  harmonica  and  say  "Give 
me  M,"  they  have  always  played  to 
pitch.  For  this  fact,  Endicott  is  not 
responsible.  In  the  most  critical  at 
tuning  of  our  strings,  Endicott  will 
cease  his  obvious  business  of  giving 
us  "A,"  and  will  break  into  little 
improvised  arpeggios  and  fanfares, 
incorrigibly.  Why  pianists  do  this  will 
never  fully  appear.  After  the  best 
disciplinary  training  that  accompa 
nist  ever  had,  Endicott  still  continues 
to  "practice  his  part"  while  the  rest 
of  us  are  tuning  our  fifths. 

From  my  position  in  the  orchestra, 
I  can  see  the  whole  group  reflected  in 
the  mirror  over  the  fireplace.  This 
helps  me  to  conduct,  and  it  also  gives 
me  pleasure.  Barbara's  'cello  is  the 
most  picturesque  of  all  our  instru- 
8 


WE  CONDUCT  AN  ORCHESTRA 

ments.  I  find  something  very  lovable 
about  the  long,  vibrant  strings,  and 
the  gracious  curves  of  its  worn,  dark 
form.  A  'cello  is  big  enough  so  that 
you  can  embrace  it  and  treat  it  as  an 
equal,  —  big  enough  to  satisfy  your 
love  for  layer  on  layer  of  velvet  tone. 
And  Geoffrey  is  the  most  picturesque 
of  all  our  players.  There  may  be  men 
who  can  play  a  cornet  with  a  per 
fectly  natural  cast  of  countenance, 
concealing  their  attention  to  a  proper 
"lip"  under  a  nonchalant  expression. 
There  is  nothing  nonchalant  about 
Geoffrey's  lean  cheek  and  beetling 
brows.  His  eyes  are  purposeful  and 
all  his  hair  erect.  His  incalculable 
legs  are  far  astray,  and  the  very  angle 
of  his  elbows  has  a  look  of  do  or 
die.  Margaret,  on  tiptoe  before  her 
9 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

tomato  pin-cushion,  is  perhaps  not 
wholly  at  one  with  the  group.  One 
evening  she  turned  briskly  about, 
waved  her  violin  like  a  brakeman's 
flag,  and  announced  that  somebody 
was  out,  and  we'd  better  begin  at 
"K." 

"It  was  old  Meggie  herself,"  said 
Geoffrey  fraternally.  "Everybody 's 
out  of  step  but  Meggie." 

Does  every  amateur  orchestra,  I 
wonder,  when  trying  new  music,  in 
terrupt  itself  sometimes  for  the  ten 
tative  inquiry,  "Are  we  all  at  T?" 
Now  and  then  we  have  an  uneasy 
feeling  that  we  all  are  not  at  "J,"  and 
a  general  assurance  that  we  are  lends 
confidence.  Another  amateur  pleasure 
of  ours  is  in  taking  liberties  with 
repeat  signs.  If  we  like  the  passage 
10 


WE  CONDUCT  AN  ORCHESTRA 

extremely,  we  mind  the  repeat;  if 
we  are  not  acutely  stirred,  we  take 
the  second  ending.  With  new  music, 
we  have  no  way  of  knowing  before 
hand  what  we  shall  especially  ad 
mire.  It  chances,  accordingly,  that 
the  cornet  and  the  'cello  perhaps 
shout  in  the  same  breath,  "Repeat! " 
and  "Don't  repeat!"  respectively.  At 
such  moments,  it  is  impossible  to 
keep  the  orchestra  together,  even 
with  two  conductors.  We  usually 
stop  and  have  a  family  consultation 
as  to  who  is  conducting  this  band, 
anyway. 

Orders  of  the  kind  just  mentioned, 
shouted  into  the  middle  of  the  music, 
are  likely  to  sound  abrupt,  not  to  say 
savage.  When  you  have  a  violin 
beneath  your  chin,  and  a  melody 
11 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

beneath  your  bow,  you  simply  can 
not  converse  in  human  tones,  no 
matter  how  mild  your  mood.  There 
is  a  certain  tenseness  about  your 
voice,  a  dictatorial  crispness  about 
your  brief  request,  that  is  likely  to 
sound  domineering.  Margaret  and 
Geoffrey,  one  evening,  almost  became 
permanently  estranged  because  Geof 
frey  in  the  midst  of  a  lovely  passage 
took  the  mouthpiece  of  his  cornet 
from  his  lips  long  enough  to  roar, 
"Three  flats!  Three  flats!"  for  her 
guidance.  Such  stage-directions  have 
a  brusque  and  startling  tone,  as  if 
the  speaker  had  stood  all  he  could 
from  you,  up  to  the  explosion  point, 
and  must  now  relieve  his  mind.  Then 
too,  there  is  of  course  a  subtle  excite 
ment  about  the  playing  that  ap- 
12 


WE  CONDUCT  AN  ORCHESTRA 

preaches  the  danger  mark  if  anything 
happens  to  spoil  the  spell.  Little 
things  seem  vital  in  such  moods. 

But  I  think  that  the  part  we  shall 
all  remember  is  something  more  diffi 
cult  to  describe.  Sometimes,  of  a 
witching  night,  when  we  all  are  keyed 
for  the  music,  and  outside  circum 
stances  behave  in  normal  fashion, 
there  comes  an  experience  worth  all 
the  years  of  scratchy  scales  that  went 
before.  We  are  in  the  midst  of  the 
Larghetto,  in  the  "Second  Sym 
phony,"  perhaps.  I  am  not  conduct 
ing.  Neither  is  Endicott.  Perhaps 
Beethoven  prefers  to  conduct  the 
Larghetto  himself.  And  then,  sud 
denly,  as  one  sometimes  on  a  journey 
becomes  vividly  aware  of  a  breeze 
and  blue  distance,  and  firm  hills  be- 
13 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

neath  his  feet,  I  really  hear  the  chord 
that  we  are  playing.  It  is  no  longer 
a  measured  flow  of  mingled  sound, 
but  distinct,  exquisite,  richly  personal 
to  me.  There  is  the  queer  little  rush 
of  the  accent  that  comes  from  the 
first  violin  when  Margaret  is  really 
stirred;  the  'cello's  full  response,  vi 
brant,  but  soft  with  hidden  masses  of 
covered  tone.  I  can  feel  my  own  little 
second  fiddle  quivering  beneath  my 
bow.  There  is  some  curious  connect 
ing  of  the  spirit  in  the  playing  of  a 
chord.  Again  and  again  we  find  it. 
Probably  these  moments  are  what 
we  live  for,  varied  though  our  pro 
grammes  always  are.  In  our  cabinet 
are  certain  ragged  folios  that  we  try 
not  to  play  too  often.  They  live  in 
promiscuous  company:  "Peer  Gynt" 
14 


WE  CONDUCT  AN  ORCHESTRA 

and  the  "Edinburgh  Quadrille" ;  Mas 
senet  and  MacDowell;  "The  Red 
Mill";  Liszt  and  Bach;  "The  Toy 
Symphony"  and  Schumann's  "  Liebes- 
garten" — each  of  these  has  its  time. 
Our  only  question  is,  "What  next?" 

At  tunes  when  we  have  been  ambi 
tious  all  the  evening,  and  Geoffrey's 
lip  is  tired,  we  hunt  up  one  of  the 
songs  arranged  for  voice  and  orches 
tra.  The  "Shoogy  Shoo"  is  one  of 
these.  Endicott  then,  in  generous 
baritone,  sings  as  he  will,  and  the 
rest  of  us,  with  mutes  astride  our 
bridges,  follow  on.  I  shall  not  hear 
that  song  without  the  picture  of  the 
group  in  the  mirror:  Endicott  upon 
the  old  red  piano-bench,  his  hair 
silver  under  the  lamplight,  his  mood 
transformed.  He  is  no  longer  the 
15 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

down-trodden  accompanist,  to  whom 
a  measure  is  restraint,  but  the  un- 
trammeled  artist  creating  his  own 
rhythms.  What  is  a  measure  or  two 
among  friends?  Then  I  watch  the 
girls,  now  wholly  at  ease,  their  bows 
moving  softly,  their  eyes  upon  their 
muted  strings.  Geoffrey  listens  with 
his  cornet  on  his  knee. 

After  all,  though  music  that  we 
long  to  play  is  far  beyond  us,  though 
we  cannot  always  find  all  the  parts, 
no  matter  how  many  times  we  search 
the  piles;  though  the  telephone  rings 
and  the  heater  blows  off  steam  — 
these  all  are  only  passing  discords. 
Some  sort  of  music  is  always  ready, 
alluring:  Mr.  Strauss  for  times  of 
enterprise,  with  all  our  reckless 
hearts;  the  "Shoogy  Shoo"  for  mo- 
16 


WE  CONDUCT  AN  ORCHESTRA 

ments  when  strings  have  snapped; 
ancient  hymns  at  twilight  of  a  Sunday 
evening,  with  Endicott  to  sing,  and 
now  and  then  a  guest  with  a  fiddle  of 
his  own.  After  such  evenings  as  these 
are  over,  when  the  children  are  put 
ting  away  the  instruments  and  folding 
the  stands,  and  I  go  about  locking  up 
the  house  for  the  night,  I  think  that  I 
do  not  greatly  care  who  really  con 
ducts  that  orchestra — Endicott  or  I. 


II 

ENDICOTT  AND  I  GO  SKETCHING 

SKETCH,"  said  Endi- 
cott,  "is  not  only  a  mem 
orandum;  it  is  a  revela 
tion." 

That  was  in  my  early  days  of  expe 
rience  with  Endicott,  when  we  were 
making  the  final  preparations  for  our 
wedding  trip.  He  took  me  into  the 
stationer's  and  bought  two  sketch 
books. 

"But  I  can't  draw,"  I  objected. 
"Neither   can    I,"    said    Endicott 
benignly,  and  pocketed  the  books. 

Little  by  little,    as  I  was  able  to 
grasp  it,  he  unfolded  to  me  the  theory 
by  which  he  governed  his  art.     He 
18 


WE  GO  SKETCHING 

began  by  saying  that  every  civilized 
being  should  habitually  keep  a  sketch 
book  wherein  to  jot  down  his  vision 
of  the  world.  This  drawing  should, 
moreover,  be  done  naturally,  never 
with  one  eye  out  for  critics.  How  else 
are  we  to  originate  a  distinctive  and 
progressive  manner?  We  should  draw 
what  we  see. 

At  first  I  was  inclined  to  be  conten 
tious.  That  was  before  I  had  seen 
Endicott's  manner. 

"When  /  draw  things,"  said  I, 
"they  never  turn  out  to  look  like 
what  I  see." 

"It  doesn't  matter  what  it  looks 
like,"  assented  Endicott.  "If  you 
draw  the  thing  as  you  see  it,  every 
stroke  of  the  pencil  is  a  shorthand 
symbol.  Years  afterward,  one  glance 
19 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

at  the  sketch  brings  it  all  back  to  you, 
though  probably  to  no  one  else.  The 
act  of  making  the  marks  shows  you 
the  scene  in  a  new  light,  and  the 
sketch  preserves  it." 

In  this  way  the  Futurist  doctrine 
in  its  rudiments  was  proclaimed  a 
generation  ahead  of  time  by  a  minor 
prophet.  I  longed  wistfully  to  be  as 
versatile  as  Endicott. 

The  first  time  we  were  alone  for  a 
peaceful  afternoon  together  after  the 
bustle  of  the  wedding  and  departure, 
he  produced  the  sketch-books  and 
passed  one  to  me.  We  were  sitting 
near  the  bluffs  at  Montauk,  and  at 
our  feet  the  low-tide  breakers,  full  of 
shell  and  seaweed  and  green  light, 
were  rolling  endlessly.  I  am  always 
hypnotized  by  surf.  At  that  particu- 
20 


WE  GO  SKETCHING 

lar  moment  I  was  helping  the  tide  to 
turn,  an  anxious  habit  which  I  out 
grew  only  after  days  of  conscientious 
attention  to  the  waves.  I  did  not 
want  to  sketch.  Who  can  sketch  and 
see  the  tide  home  both  at  once? 
I  surmised,  however,  that  Endicott 
might  not  understand  my  role  as 
chaperon  to  the  tide,  and  I  politely 
accepted  his  best  pencil. 

I  had  done  just  enough  drawing  in 
my  youth  to  know  a  few  principles 
and  to  shrink  from  practice.  With  a 
helpless  feeling  I  looked  up  toward 
the  bluffs,  deciding  that  they,  with 
their  bold  and  stable  outlines,  were 
the  safest  subject  in  sight.  Endicott, 
at  a  little  distance,  began  to  sketch 
busily,  and  I  realized  that  for  the 
first  time  in  my  life  I  was  sitting  for  a 
21 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

portrait.  There  was  exhilaration  in 
the  thought  that  I  was  about  to  see 
how  I  really  looked  to  Endicott.  For 
him,  he  announced  graciously,  there 
was  only  one  object  on  that  beach. 

Finally,  just  as  I  had  begun  des 
perately  to  block  in  my  sketch,  En 
dicott  rose. 

"Now  I  dare  say  that  nobody  else 
would  consider  this  a  good  portrait," 
he  began,  "but  I  shall  never  look  at 
it  without  seeing  you  just  as  you  are 
now." 

All  this  happened  many  years  ago, 
when  I  was  young  and  proud  of 
spirit.  The  shade-hats  that  year  were 
at  their  sweetest,  and  mine  was  an 
effective  thing  of  white  lilacs  and 
silver-green  and  white.  My  dress  was 
soft  and  graceful,  and  my  boots  were 
22 


WE  GO  SKETCHING 


notably  trim.  Just  how  much  of  this, 
I  wondered  as  I  looked  at  the  sketch, 
had  really  been  wasted  upon  Endi- 
cott?  I  think  that  I  blushed,  but  I 


know  that  I  did  not  laugh.  Endicott's 
theory  of  a  sketch  as  a  revelation  was 
too  serious  a  matter.  There  was, 
moreover,  a  certain  virile  flourish 
about  the  artist's  signature  which 
bespoke  finality.  "E.  M.  A.  pinxit." 
This  was  his  changeless  hall-mark 
upon  completed  works.  What  was  I 
to  quarrel  with  an  early  Futurist 
about  details  of  chin  and  waist-line 
23 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

and  coiffure?  Of  course,  if  Endicott 
saw  it  that  way — ! 

Through  the  weeks  that  followed, 
each  companionable  adventure  was 
celebrated  by  a  sketch.  My  own 
efforts  were  touchingly  conscientious. 

"You  keep  trying  to  draw  as  you 
ought  to,"  sighed  Endicott  hope 
lessly,  glancing  through  my  neat 
diagrams  of  headland  and  farmhouse 
and  wall.  Try  as  I  might,  I  could 
never  learn  the  secret  which  chart 
ered  my  companion's  genius.  Memo 
rable  among  his  landscapes  was  his 
sunset  view  of  "  Conklin's-by-the- 
Sea."  All  these  years  our  children 
have  admired  the  Conklin  ducks, 
skillfully  arranged  with  inspired  per 
spective  so  that  the  fowls  nearest  the 
observer  were  ostrich-like  in  propor- 
24 


WE  GO  SKETCHING 


tions,  growing  smaller  and  smaller  as 
the  procession  neared  the  house,  until 
those  by  the  door  appeared  scarcely 
larger  than  the  landlady  herself. 

Surreptitiously,  Endicott  portrayed 
"Old  Grumbler,"  our  one  fellow- 
boarder,  an  English 
man  with  pipe  and 
sun-hat,  reminiscent 
of  Kipling  and  In 
dia.  I  have  always 
been  more  deeply 
impressed  by  Endi- 
cott's  character  in-  . 
terpretations  than 
by  his  studies  from  still  life,  remark 
able  as  they  often  turn  out  to  be. 

"My  Cousin  Abby  does  n't  like  to 
have  me    sketch,"   mused   Endicott 
one  afternoon,  putting  the  finishing 
25 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

touches  to  a  freshly  drawn  cartoon  of 
a  casual  wayfarer  who  had  just  put 
in  a  mysterious  appearance  at  Conk- 
lin's,  "but  I  intend  to  keep  just  such 
a  book  as  this  through  all  our  vaca 
tions  to  come." 

He  did.  There  is  an  entire  volume  of 
Watch  Hill  scenes,  where  the  seaside 
chapel  furnished  a  favorite  model. 
There  is  one  sketch  of  the  interior 
of  this  chapel  —  where  the  officiating 
rector  preaches  forever  unheard,  while 
the  beholder's  attention  is  divided 
between  the  curious  texts  upon  the 
chapel  walls  and  the  still  more  curi 
ous-looking  dog  that  barks  savagely 
in  penciled  balloons  just  outside  the 
place  of  prayer.  A  later  book  contains 
Block  Island  sketches,  including  one 
of  "Camp  As  You  Like  It,"  where 
26 


WE  GO  SKETCHING 


the  grazing  horse  appears  to  range 
unbridled  in  the  sky;  and  a  "study 
from  life,"  where  I  am  apparently 
sliding  down  the  face  of  South  Cliff, 


while  our  eldest  daughter  in  her  baby- 
carriage  coasts  miraculously  alongside. 
Cousin  Abby,   as  had  been  pre 
dicted,  cordially  disapproved.  She  is 
an  artist,  and  had  been  a  convenient 
crony  of  Endicott's  in  his  law-school 
days.  During  her  occasional  visits  to 
27 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

our  home,  as  years  went  on,  I  noted 
her  unchastened  way  of  commenting 
with  open  sarcasm  upon  Endicott's 
various  convictions,  but  I  never 
heard  what  Cousin  Abby  could  do  in 
the  cause  of  righteousness  until  one 
day  she  found  one  of  the  children's 
sketch-books  lying  open  on  the  table. 
Endicott,  thoroughly  discouraged 
with  me,  had  provided  a  complete 
set  of  sketching-books  for  his  chil 
dren  and  had  pointed  them  each  the 
path  to  freedom.  Barbara  was  the 
only  one  that  took  to  freedom.  The 
others  steadfastly  consulted  models. 
Their  favorite  pattern  was  the  one 
sketch  in  their  father's  book  that  was 
flatly  conventional.  That  sketch  was 
made  upon  one  of  our  flying  trips 
through  Easthampton,  the  village 
28 


WE  GO  SKETCHING 

of  many  windmills.  Endicott  an 
nounced  his  intention  of  rising  be 
fore  time  for  our  early  train  to  sketch 
one  of  the  windmills  on  the  bluff.  At 
sunrise,  however,  he  felt  less  enter 
prising,  and,  noticing  that  there  were 
windmills  on  the  wall-paper,  he  ease- 
fully  copied  one  of  these  instead.  In 
conspicuous  exception  to  his  usual 
fervid  manner,  this  sketch  has  served 
as  a  copy  for  one  after  another  of  the 
toiling  children;  but  not  for  Barbara. 
One  thrilled  glance  through  the  Mon- 
tauk  sketch-book,  and  Barbara  was 
off  after  ducks  and  fence-rails  and  a 
horizon  of  her  own.  No  wall-paper 
windmills  for  her! 

It  happened  to  be  Barbara's  book 
that  Cousin  Abby  found.  She  took  it 
to  Endicott.  She  took  it  seriously. 
29 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

"It  doesn't  so  much  matter  about 
you,"  she  began  in  a  tone  of  dry 
decision,  "but  it  is  wrong  to  let 
Barbara  do  so.  Look  at  the  pattern 
of  that  parlor  lamp  in  the  window  of 
that  house!  Look  at  the  shingles  on 
that  barn,  and  the  black  spots  on 
those  tiger-lilies.  Notice  the  leaves  on 
that  rosebush ! " 

"Barbara  saw  them,"  said  Endicott. 

"But  she  shouldn't  draw  them!" 
Cousin  Abby  turned  suddenly  from 
the  conflict.  Not  debate,  but  action 
was  her  specialty.  She  led  the  adoring 
Barbara  through  a  perfect  paradise 
of  light  and  shade;  of  doorsteps  that 
stood  out  nobly  from  the  verandas  of 
the  houses;  of  long,  tapering  roads 
ending  beautifully  in  a  point  among 
the  trees;  and  of  lonely  sky-lines, 
30 


WE  GO  SKETCHING 

with  one  dim  ridge  of  hills  to  mark 
the  sunset.  She  gave  her  a  box  of 
water-colors  and  talked  about  flat 
washes  and  composition.  Cruelly  she 
spoiled  Barbara's  joy  in  depicting 
the  sun's  rays.  Barbara  had  hitherto 
used  the  same  general  plan  for  the 
sun  as  for  a  many-footed  spider. 
After  Cousin  Abby's  visit  she  felt  a 
little  shy  about  her  sunrises,  her  high 
noons,  and  her  sunsets.  She  often 
left  the  sun  to  shine  from  a  point 
just  off  the  margin  of  the  paper. 
Cousin  Abby,  however,  could  not  be 
expected  to  forestall  every  possibility. 
Barbara  still  drew  the  moon  with 
eyes  and  nose  and  mouth. 

Expert     opinion,     decidedly     ex 
pressed,  carries  a  great  deal  of  weight 
with  me.  Was  Barbara  indeed  a  child 
31 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

of  promise,  led  deliberately  into  sin? 
Endicott  was  unmoved.  He  said  that 
the  reason  why  so  few  people  draw 
naturally  is  because  there  are  so 
many  Cousins  Abby  in  the  world. 
He  held  that  it  was  time  for  some 
hardy  souls  to  rise  and  insist  that 
they  do  see  the  flower-pots  in  the 
window,  and  the  cat  on  the  ridge 
pole,  and  the  honey-bee  coming  a 
long  way  off.  Who  cares  for  a  gray 
monotone  of  homestead  wall  on  which 
one  may  paint  no  lichens  at  all,  and 
the  trumpet-vine  only  as  a  green 
puddle  on  the  roof?  He  was  glad  that 
Barbara,  in  her  seashore  sketch,  had 
made  her  sister  the  dominant  note  in 
the  landscape.  What  matter  if  Mar 
garet,  passant,  did  obscure  the  sky 
line  and  tower  above  the  sailing-yacht 
32 


WE  GO  SKETCHING 

at  her  elbow?  It  was  pleasant  to  re 
flect  that  she  was  more  to  Barbara 
than  all  of  these. 

Gradually,  however,  Endicott  came 
to  see  that  with  Barbara  the  damage 
had  already  been  done.  Sophisticated 
now,  she  could  never  again  fully  enter 
the  realm  of  the  unspoiled  amateur. 
Her  trees,  of  old  so  strongly  built  that 
orioles  and  fly-catchers  lodged  in 
their  branches,  nests  and  all,  were 
now  leafless  blurs  of  misty  green;  and 
over  her  houses  grew  vague  tracery 
of  vines  without  a  bud  or  flower, 
unvisited  by  any  humming-bird  or 
wandering  dragon-fly.  That  was 
proof. 

We  compromised.  Endicott,  though 
still  laying  by  a  supply  of  sketch 
books  for  himself,  gave  me  a  camera, 
33 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

and  engaged  a  drawing  teacher  for 
Barbara.  Thoughtfully  he  watched 
the  work  of  many  artists  for  adequate 
paintings  of  surf  and  windy  shores. 
Upon  our  walls  hangs  one  of  these,  a 
painting  of  Montauk  breakers,  with 
all  their  surge  and  foam  and  change 
ful  light.  I  love  the  stately  picture, 
but  where  are  the  frightened  little 
sandpipers  that  were  always  hurrying 
along  the  shore? 

To-day,  feeling  homesick  for  old 
times,  I  gather  up  the  little  heap 
of  sketching-books  and  glance  them 
through  again.  Sea  wind  and  flowing 
tide  and  comfortable  memories.  I 
wonder  if  the  windmill  is  still  there? 
And  "Josiah  Peckham,  His  House'*  — 
is  it  still  upon  the  sand?  Here  indeed 
are  all  the  little  intimate  signs  of  life, 
34 


WE  GO  SKETCHING 

the  shorthand  notes  of  all  our  memo 
ries;  even  the  ducks  and  flying  gulls 
and  fisher-nets  offshore.  When  Endi- 
cott  went  sketching  he  saw  these. 


Ill 

ENDICOTT  AND  I  CONDUCT 
FAMILY  PRAYERS 


NDICOTT  is  a  born  pa 
triarch.  Thirty  years  ago, 
when  we  were  setting  up 
our  first  household  ar 
rangements,  when  I  was  chiefly  occu 
pied  in  placing  the  furniture  and 
putting  away  my  wedding  silver,  En- 
dicott  discussed  with  me  the  erec 
tion  of  a  family  altar.  As  I  look  back 
upon  it  now,  I  confess  that  we  felt  an 
unwarranted  complacency  at  the  ease 
with  which  we  observed  the  custom 
of  daily  prayers.  We  did  not  see  why 
every  family  should  not  do  it.  It 
seemed  a  fitting  close  to  every  new 
36 


WE  CONDUCT  FAMILY  PRAYERS 

day,  this  quiet  moment  of  reading 
•md  prayer  as  we  sat  together  be 
fore  the  fireplace.  We  realized  that 
it  safeguarded  our  companionship  as 
few  other  things  could  have  done.  A 
married  couple  cannot  maintain  a 
strained  relation  and  family  prayers 
both  at  the  same  time.  We  knew  that 
the  custom  gave  balance  and  tone  to 
our  somewhat  spirited  early  years 
together.  It  seemed,  moreover,  nat 
ural  and  easy  to  arrange. 

Now,  after  the  lapse  of  three  dec 
ades,  the  custom  remains  unbroken; 
and  it  is  once  more  the  calm  and 
simple  matter  that  it  was  at  first.  In 
the  intervening  years,  however,  its 
history  has  been  that  of  the  Church 
Militant,  at  times  in  danger.  Most 
mothers,  I  suppose,  reckon  their  fam- 
37 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

ily  annals  from  certain  significant 
changes  that  marked  the  growth  of 
the  family  group.  Some  would  date 
events  from  necessary  changes  in  the 
arrangement  of  the  house ;  some  from 
periods  of  illness  in  the  family;  some 
from  various  experiments  in  the  chil 
dren's  education.  The  most  significant 
gauge  of  our  own  family's  progress 
toward  civilization,  however,  would 
be  the  varying  methods,  spirit,  and 
times  of  day  that  we  have  tried  for 
family  prayers. 

If  all  the  children  had  been  like 
Margaret,  the  upheavals  would  not 
have  been  so  marked.  The  only 
change  that  she  caused  was  a  shift  in 
the  hour  of  devotions.  To  accommo 
date  her  early  programme,  we  stopped 
our  evening  prayers,  and  arranged  to 
38 


WE  CONDUCT  FAMILY  PRAYERS 

have  morning  worship  among  her 
earliest  impressions.  She  was  a 
thoughtful,  religious  little  baby,  and 
sat  contentedly  in  my  lap  while  we 
read  and  sang  the  hymn.  But  the 
other  children  were  interested  in  no 
godly  thing.  My  most  ambitious  aim 
was  to  keep  them  in  any  sort  of  quiet 
until  the  service  was  over.  This  did 
not  satisfy  Endicott.  He  missed  the 
spirit  of  true  devotion;  he  wanted  not 
only  good  order,  but  worship  in  spirit 
and  in  truth.  And  true  devoutness 
dwelt  not  in  the  spirit  of  Barbara  nor 
of  Geoffrey. 

Barbara  spoke  familiarly  of  our 
morning  worship  as  "the  meetinV 
She  had  a  penchant  for  bringing 
things  to  the  meeting  —  things  in 
tended  to  be  used  as  supplementary 
39 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

hand-work  while  the  service  went 
on.  She  communicated  adroitly  with 
Geoffrey  during  the  prayer.  She  cor 
rupted  the  well-trained  Margaret  into 
timing  the  exercises  accurately,  with 
careful  eye  on  the  clock.  She  stipu 
lated  that  the  meeting  should  be  not 
more  than  five  minutes  long.  We 
were  worried  about  Barbara. 

We  finally  decided  that  we  must 
adapt  ourselves  somewhat  to  her 
habit  of  thought,  since  she  was  in  no 
degree  ready  to  adapt  herself  to  ours. 
Although  Barbara  was  not  spiritually 
minded,  at  least  we  knew  that  she 
was  intellectual.  We  planned,  there 
fore,  to  change  the  spirit  of  our 
"meeting"  from  the  worshipful  to  the 
educational.  Barbara  might  not  be 
able  to  listen  receptively  to  a  passage 
40 


WE  CONDUCT  FAMILY  PRAYERS 

of  Scripture,  but  she  could  memorize 
one  with  finish  and  dispatch.  She 
could,  moreover,  fire  Margaret  and 
Geoffrey  to  similar  deeds.  We  were 
startled  at  their  progress.  We  began 
with  detached  verses  which  we  re 
peated  every  morning  until  they  be 
came  familiar.  Then,  with  a  quickness 
which  seemed  uncanny  to  our  more 
laborious  mature  minds,  the  children 
learned  chapter  after  chapter  with  no 
apparent  effort.  Barbara,  we  learned, 
held  private  exercises  for  review  be 
tween  times  upon  the  front  stairs  for 
a  rostrum,  until  one  day  she  was  con 
ducting  a  hymn  so  vigorously  that 
she  fell  the  length  of  the  flight,  baton 
and  hymnal  in  hand. 

Endicott's  chief  anxiety  now  fixed 
upon  Barbara's  debonair  manner  of 
41 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

mispronouncing  the  Biblical  terms. 
She  especially  clung  to  her  formula, 
"Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  John,  Ax." 
One  morning  it  became  her  portion 
to  recite  the  books  of  the  New  Tes 
tament.  She  gave  Matthew,  Mark, 
Luke,  and  John,  and  stopped,  unac 
countably.  Prompting  was  against 
Endicott's  principles.  With  careful 
suggestions  he  tried  to  stir  his  legal- 
minded  descendant  to  think  of  the 
next  book.  But  nothing  stirred  the 
mind  of  Barbara. 

Endicott  at  last  resorted  to  a  des 
perate  measure.  "What  do  you  chop 
wood  with?  "  asked  Endicott. 

Light    broke.    Barbara's  face   was 
radiant.   "Hammer!"   said  Barbara, 
and  went  on  to  Romans  and  Corin 
thians  unchallenged. 
42 


WE  CONDUCT  FAMILY  PRAYERS 

Endicott  sometimes  questioned  our 
wisdom  in  converting  our  quiet  time 
of  prayer  and  meditation  into  this 
sort  of  memory  drill.  We  discussed 
possible  ways  of  restoring  some  of  the 
old-time  spirit  of  beauty  to  the  cere 
mony. 

"  Would  it  help  if  we  knelt  for  the 
prayer?"  queried  Endicott.  We  tried 
this  experiment  one  morning  when 
Geoffrey  had  just  recovered  from  a 
rather  serious  childish  ailment.  All 
of  us  were  feeling  deeply,  and  the 
little  additional  ceremony  seemed 
appropriate  and  sincere.  Endicott, 
however,  on  that  particular  Sunday 
morning,  was  robed  in  a  certain 
dressing-gown  of  a  cut  which  dated 
from  his  riotous  law-school  days.  Its 
folds  settled  comfortably  and  volumi- 
43 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

nously  about  his  figure,  in  lines  more 
classic  than  conventional.  After  the 
prayer  was  over,  the  infant  Geof 
frey  chuckled  happily.  "You  ought 
to  have  seen  how  funny  Papa  looked 
all  cuddled  down  that  way,"  said 
Geoffrey.  Thereafter  we  always  main 
tained  an  upright  Congregational  at 
titude  during  the  prayer. 

As  the  children  grew  older  and  the 
family  life  more  complex,  the  meeting 
was  harder  and  harder  to  plan  for.  I 
have  wondered  if  in  every  home  the 
time  for  family  worship  is  always  the 
signal  for  interruptions?  The  activi 
ties  of  the  telephone,  the  grocer's  boy, 
the  postman,  and  Endicott's  clients, 
all  seemed  to  center  punctually  upon 
the  few  minutes  allotted  for  our  brief 
devotions.  Endicott  and  I  were  a  good 
44 


WE  CONDUCT  FAMILY  PRAYERS 

while  coming  to  an  agreement  about 
how  I  ought  to  treat  the  incoming 
grocery  man.  Should  the  maid  be 
instructed  to  entertain  him,  or  should 
I  put  his  claims  before  my  commun 
ion  with  my  Maker?  If  the  telephone 
rang  for  Endicott,  should  he  leave, 
and  resume  his  reading  after  a  pro 
longed  business  consultation?  These 
were  nice  questions  about  which  we 
could  find  no  reliable  precedent. 
There  is  no  grocery  boy  in  the 
"Cotter's  Saturday  Night,"  and  no 
telephone.  Nor  did  the  children  in 
those  days  have  to  start  for  High 
School  at  half  past  seven. 

Once  more  we  changed  the  form  of 
our  programme.  We  no  longer  gath 
ered   around   the    fireplace,  but   re 
mained    at    the    breakfast-table  for 
45 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

the  briefest  possible  reading.  If  an 
interruption  occurred,  we  adjourned, 
hoping  for  better  luck  next  time.  I 
still  think  that  this  was  wise.  It  saved 
the  custom  from  absolute  destruction 
in  those  busy  years  of  early  pro 
grammes  and  varied  interests. 

This  breakfast-table  arrangement 
involved  one  difficulty.  At  times  it 
was  hard  to  manage  a  natural  transi 
tion  from  table  conversation  to  wor 
ship.  Ideally,  of  course,  the  table- 
talk  and  the  beauty  of  holiness  should 
merge  and  blend  with  no  incongruity. 
Sometimes  our  own  did  not.  Once, 
long  after  school-days  were  over, 
when  the  children  were  at  home  on  a 
vacation,  we  were  in  the  midst  of  an 
uncensored  discussion  of  the  latest 
gossip.  Endicott  was  not  listening. 
46 


WE  CONDUCT  FAMILY  PRAYERS 

Barbara  was  well  launched  upon  an 
emphatic  exposition  of  her  decided 
opinions,  and  paused  midway  for 
breath. 

"Hosea  eleven,  one  to  twelve,"  said 
Endicott,  unexpectedly  beginning  to 
read. 

"Speaking  of  guns,"  gasped  Bar 
bara. 

Margaret  choked  and  vanished 
from  the  room,  Geoffrey  helpfully 
attending  her  with  a  glass  of  water. 
Barbara,  perfectly  composed,  but 
knowing  herself  to  be  the  root  of  all 
evil,  followed  them  loyally.  I  was 
left  gazing  fixedly  at  the  picture  of 
Henry  W.  Longfellow  on  the  wall, 
and  trying  to  recall  enough  of  his 
biography  to  keep  my  mind  from 
other  things,  while  Endicott  went 
47 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

seriously  along  with  Hosea.  I  knew 
that  the  children  were  well  on  their 
way  up  the  street  to  finish  their 
hysterics  at  their  grandmother's.  En- 
dicott,  since  then,  waits  for  a  signal 
from  me  before  he  ventures  to  intro 
duce  Hosea. 

These  have  been  a  few  of  the 
problems.  They  seem  strangely  far 
in  the  past  and  unimportant  now. 
We  smile  almost  affectionately  when 
we  remember  the  old-time  grocery 
boy  and  the  postman  of  those  days. 
All  the  details  have  gathered  grace 
through  the  years.  None  of  us  would 
willingly  forget  those  Sunday  morn 
ings  when  all  three  children  climbed 
upon  the  long  piano-bench  beside 
Endicott  to  sing  "Welcome,  Delight 
ful  Morn,"  and  "My  days  are  gliding 
48 


WE  CONDUCT  FAMILY  PRAYERS 

swiftly  by";  nor  the  times  when  Bar 
bara,  rocking  vigorously  in  her  little 
chair,  led  her  brethren  in  responsive 
Scripture.  And  now,  upon  the  rare 
occasions  when  the  children  are  all 
at  home  again,  the  "meeting"  seems 
very  dear  and  altogether  lovely.  It 
has  made  us  rich  in  memories  and  in 
a  certain  spiritual  continuity  of  fam 
ily  life. 

Endicott  and  I  were  mistaken  when 
we  thought  that  it  would  be  easy 
to  arrange.  We  were  short-sighted  in 
allowing  outside  distractions  to  loom 
so  large.  I  am  glad  that  we  were  mili 
tant.  We  know  now  that  through  all 
those  years  our  Early  Church  was 
gathering  power.  I  believe  that  any 
family  who  will  cling  to  this  ancient 
rite  will  find  it  not  only  the  source  of 
49 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

precious  memories,  but  the  embodi 
ment  of  a  deep  unity  of  spirit,  richly 
inspiring.  The  family  life  will  almost 
surely  be  linked  with  the  eternal,  in 
a  way  which  will  endure  through  all 
separation,  far  beyond  the  time  when 
daily  meetings  must  be  things  of  long 
ago. 


IV 

THE  FLOOR 

ETTING  the  floor  in  a  dis 
cussion  conducted  in  our 
family  is  no  simple  mat 
ter;  but  once  you  have  it, 
you  are  safe.  We  do  not  interrupt. 
Changing  the  subject,  making  irrele 
vant  comments,  or  breaking  up  into 
little  subgroups  and  talking  all  at  once, 
are  matters  that  we  deal  with  to  the 
full  extent  of  the  Parliamentary  law. 
We  do  this,  not  because  we  are  polite, 
but  because  each  of  us  loves  an  audi 
ence.  We  love  it  to  the  extent  that  we 
are  willing  to  grant  it  to  others  on  the 
condition  that  they  may  later  do  even 
so  to  us.  If  one  of  us  starts  to  talk, 
51 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

the  others  listen;  if  two  start  at  once, 
precedence  is  given  to  the  elder,  or  the 
female.  Geoffrey,  it  is  true,  being 
youngest,  and  male,  has  led  an  anx 
ious  life.  But  even  he,  once  started, 
was  always  absolutely  sure  of  the 
undivided  attention  of  the  whole 
house. 

On  this  tradition,  we  have  estab 
lished  the  family  conclave.  The  gen 
uine  friendly  conversation  demands 
this  sense  of  safety.  The  most  harrow 
ing  page  in  any  literature,  to  my  way 
of  thinking,  is  the  passage  where 
Mr.  Direck  tries  in  vain  to  tell  Mr. 
Britling  about  the  little  incident  that 
happened  to  his  friend  Robinson  in 
Toledo.  Certainly  one  of  the  most 
pathetic  touches  is  poor  Mr.  Direck's 
wistful  day-dream  later  when  he 
52 


THE  FLOOR 

imagines  himself  talking  very  slowly 
and  carefully,  while  Mr.  Drilling  lis 
tens.  "Already  he  was  more  than  half 
way  into  dreamland,"  observes  Mr. 
Wells,  "or  he  could  never  have  sup 
posed  anything  so  incredible." 

A  certain  cousin  of  ours  is  very  like 
Mr.  Britling.  She  is  to  be  found  at 
a  fine  old  farmhouse  where  we  visit 
now  and  then.  Whenever,  in  a  placid 
moment,  we  all  sit  talking  with  the 
aunts  and  uncles,  this  particular 
cousin,  not  less  dear  than  the  others, 
but  more  restive,  will  come  in  from 
the  milk-room,  talking  all  the  way. 
We  hear  her  coming,  and  suspend 
whatever  sentence  we  are  in  the 
middle  of,  to  strain  our  ears  to  hear 
her;  much  as  an  Episcopal  congrega 
tion  pricks  up  when  the  choir-boys 
53 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

begin  to  chant  the  processional  in 
distant  chapels.  By  that  long-range 
method,  our  cousin  puts  a  stop  to  our 
subject-matter,  preempts  the  floor, 
and  ignores  our  squatters'  claims. 
We  have  only  to  refer  to  cousin 
Britling  when  one  of  us,  at  home, 
changes  the  subject  without  giving 
due  notice  in  advance.  "Come  in 
from  the  milk-room,"  we  implore, 
and  the  offender  at  once  subsides. 

There  are  groups,  I  know,  who  are 
not  comfortable  unless  everybody  is 
talking  all  the  time.  Put  six  of  them 
in  one  room,  and  they  automatically 
split  up  into  three  groups  of  two 
talkers  each.  Each  group  listens  with 
scattering  attention  to  itself  and  to 
the  adjoining  one;  remarks  are  over 
heard  and  replied  to  in  bright  asides; 
54 


THE  FLOOR 

counter-messages  are  tossed  back  and 
forth  with  no  checking  system;  until 
finally  nobody  is  really  talking  to  any 
body  else,  although  nobody  is  silent 
for  an  instant. 

The  only  parallel  that  I  can  think 
of  is  the  way  in  which,  during  very 
early  years,  the  children  sometimes 
played  tiddledywinks.  When  the  man- 
made  rules  of  that  staid  sport  became 
too  wearing  for  their  advanced  intel 
lects,  they  used  to  get  to  snapping 
all  at  once,  promiscuously.  Every 
body  snapped  everybody  else's  wink, 
at  the  bull's-eye  or  the  eye  of  his 
neighbor,  regardless.  This  indiscrimi- 
nating  sort  of  thing  lends  a  lawless 
charm  most  bracing  to  tiddledywinks, 
but  it  cancels  conversation. 

Now  this  is  no  mere  craving  for 
55 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

long-winded  monologues.  We  simply 
like  a  group,  and  we  like  to  keep  it 
whole.  Why  must  it  be  broken  up 
into  chattering  fragments?  We  want 
to  see  the  personalities  emerge  dis 
tinctly.  We  like  to  hear  a  sustained 
sentence  of  each  .man's  making,  and 
enjoy  the  swift  current  of  challenging 
thought  that  makes  itself  felt  in  a 
group  of  expressive  beings  who  are  all 
awaiting  their  turn  to  have  their  say. 
The  interplay  of  individualities  is 
more  vivid  and  quickening  if  both 
men  and  women  are  of  the  group ;  but 
beware  of  those  ladies  who,  the  in 
stant  a  remark  stirs  their  interest,  are 
possessed  to  gather  a  private  auditor 
or  two  and  start  a  low-voiced  com 
mittee-meeting  of  their  own,  instead 
of  enriching  the  general  group  with 
56 


THE  FLOOR 

their  opinions.  Such  centers  of  volu 
bility  in  the  side-lines  ruin  real  talk. 

I  suppose  that  even  I  would  not 
demand  that  the  guests  at  a  large 
social  function  should  sit  in  a  great 
ring  while  each  in  turn  stood  up  and 
gave  his  Oral  Theme.  At  large  recep 
tions  everybody  must  talk  and  no 
body  listens.  But  who  likes  a  large 
reception  anyway? 

What  I  really  do  like  is  a  group 
of  guests  around  our  fireplace  of  a 
winter  evening,  when  Geoffrey  comes 
home  unexpectedly  from  his  work. 
Barbara  meets  him  in  the  hall,  and  in 
her  condensed  and  rapid  way  gives 
him  the  outline  of  such  recent  gossip 
as  he  needs  to  know.  I  meanwhile  slip 
away  in  the  direction  of  the  larder, 
and  beckon  him  out  for  a  sustaining 
57 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

bit  of  pie.  I  have  learned  that  Geof 
frey  rates  it  one  of  the  most  exquisite 
joys  of  an  unexpected  home-coming  to 
have  his  mother  offer  him  food  of  the 
forbidden  variety  that  he  had  to  steal 
out  of  the  moonlit  refrigerator  of  old. 

"Who's  in  there?"  says  Geoffrey 
from  his  throne  on  the  kitchen  table. 

He  learns. 

"What  are  they  talking  about?" 

Barbara  gracefully  eavesdrops 
round  the  dining-room  door.  "Father 
is  telling  his  Darius  Cobb  stories," 
she  reports  cheerfully. 

"Then  we  have  plenty  of  time." 
Geoffrey  finishes  his  pie  with  the 
lingering  Fletcherism  of  which  its 
brand  is  worthy;  and  we  watch  and 
listen  for  an  interval  when  we  can 
join  the  fireside  group. 
58 


THE  FLOOR 

There,  in  that  circle  of  alert  men 
and  women  of  assorted  ages  and  call 
ings,  our  thoughts  feather  out  and 
fly.  There  is  time  to  think,  and  time 
to  express  one's  mind;  time  also  to 
change  it.  It  is  not  only  an  inter 
change  of  ready-made  ideas;  it  is  a 
chance  to  hatch  some  new  ones  and 
add  them  to  our  own.  We  catch  tan 
talizing  glimpses  into  each  other's 
hidden  prejudices,  and  we  disclose 
unexpected  convictions  by  the  way. 

But  the  most  intimate  moment  of 
all  comes  after  the  company  goes. 
Probably  a  truly  upright  family 
would  not  comment  upon  the  van 
ished  guest.  We  do.  We  discuss  him 
and  all  his  works.  Sometimes,  after 
this  stimulating  ceremony  is  over 
and  we  are  on  our  way  to  bed,  some- 
59 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

body  thinks  of  an  additional  grain 
of  truth  which  calls  for  conflicting 
comment.  We  pause  upon  the  stairs 
for  another  session.  I  can  see  Endi- 
cott  dimly,  by  the  half-light  in  the 
hall,  as  he  brings  down  his  fist  on  the 
newel  post  to  emphasize  a  vigorous 
ultimatum.  In  the  heavy  shadows  he 
looks  like  a  Rodin  study  of  Authority. 
I  seat  myself  comfortably  on  the  top 
most  stair  and  peer  down  through 
the  banisters  at  him,  and  bide  my 
time.  When  that  time  comes,  I  know, 
I  shall  carry  my  point;  but  for  the 
present  he  has  the  floor.  The  floor!  — 
that  choice  possession  which  none  ex 
cept  the  very  spry  can  take  away! 


RETRIEVING  THE  AIREDALE 


E  are  sending  Geoffrey  a 
half-grown  Airedale  pup," 
wrote  Uncle  Tyler.  "His 
registered  name  is  Jasper 
III.  Don't  let  him  run  by  himself 
until  you  have  shown  him  the  coun 
try." 

If  Jasper  was  a  puppy,  he  was  old 
for  his  age.  He  was  approximately 
the  size  of  a  sheep,  though  more 
gaunt  and  rangey  in  build;  and  he 
had  the  easy  gait  of  a  zebra.  His 
expression  was  worn  and  sapient. 
This  aspect  of  advanced  age  was 
heightened  by  the  brown  wisps  of 
beard  that  floated  around  his  chin. 
61 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

He  had  an  elderly  mannerism  of 
cocking  one  eyebrow  and  glancing 
about,  sidelong,  out  of  the  corner  of 
one  cynical  eye.  He  looked  like  an 
ancient  dervish  —  shrewd  and  inscru 
table. 

But  however  aged  Jasper  looked, 
his  stride  was  agile.  "Don't  let  the 
dog  out!"  shouted  the  family  in  one 
breath  if  one  of  us  went  to  the  door. 
We  developed  an  elaborate  tech 
nique  of  stage-exit  to  get  out  of  the 
house  at  all;  first  backing  discreetly 
to  the  door,  squeezing  hastily  through 
and  finally  stuffing  back  such  por 
tions  of  Jasper's  leaping  frame  as 
had  managed  to  emerge. 

Twice  daily,  our  pet  walked  out 
on  a  leash.  Geoffrey  was  showing  him 
the  country.  The  rest  of  us  were 
62 


RETRIEVING  THE  AIREDALE 

offered  in  turn  the  privilege  of  acting 
as  Burton  Holmes  ourselves,  if  we 
liked,  but  we  all  assured  Geoffrey 
that  we  objected  personally  to  going 
on  a  leash.  Our  dog  had  therefore 
seen  only  such  parts  of  the  country 
as  his  master  had  had  time  to  show 
him,  when,  on  New  Year's  Sunday, 
he  escaped. 

Margaret  was  responsible.  Two 
friends  had  called  for  her  to  go  with 
them  to  four  o'clock  Vespers.  Know 
ing  the  habits  of  our  captive  animal, 
they  opened  the  door  cautiously,  one 
of  them  guarding  the  entrance  with 
her  knee.  Jasper  was  too  quick,  and 
too  expert  at  the  pole-vaulter's  art. 
He  flew  over  the  puny  barrier,  rushed 
down  the  drive,  and  pranced  deliri 
ously  off  across  the  snow. 
63 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

"Catch  him!"  gasped  the  girls,  as 
Margaret  plunged  down  the  steps. 
She  whistled  busily  as  she  ran.  Surely 
he  would  come!  He  was  still  in  sight 
against  the  sky-line,  dancing  on  his 
hind  legs  like  some  fairy-tale  goblin 
in  the  snow.  If  only  they  could  reach 
the  top  of  the  hill  before  he  finished 
his  barn-dance!  Just  at  this  point, 
the  minister's  bull-dog  Mike  came 
trotting  happily  down  the  west  road, 
and  with  him  Terence,  the  belligerent 
Irish  terrier  owned  by  the  High- 
School  principal.  Into  this  impeccable 
company  sailed  Jasper,  a  yelping 
lunatic,  wild  with  joy.  They  greeted 
him  with  shouts,  and  all  three  rolled 
with  amusement  in  the  drifts. 

The  breathless  girls  came  scram 
bling  over  the  hill,  and  charged  three 

64 


RETRIEVING  THE  AIREDALE 

abreast  toward  the  heap  of  dogs. 
Jasper  saw  them  first.  With  a  kanga 
roo  leap  he  cleared  the  fence,  and, 
followed  by  Mike  and  the  terrier, 
went  skimming  in  great  sweeping 
circles  toward  the  square.  Here,  Ad 
miral  Suns,  the  grocer's  young  span 
iel,  joined  the  flying  squadron.  The 
dogs  stopped  to  explain  matters  to 
the  Admiral. 

"Oh!"  gasped  one  of  the  pursuers, 
"if  we  could  only  creep  up  on  'em 
now!" 

Creeping  up,  one  finds,  is  not  the 
right  method  of  pursuit  for  such  as 
Jasper.  They  had  barely  gained  the 
green  when  Judge  Granger's  white 
setter,  Lady  Montague,  appeared 
around  the  corner  by  the  church, 
Head  over  heels  went  Admiral  Sims 
65 


ENDICOTT 

Swifter  than  eagles  flew  Mike  and  the 
terrier.  But  more  fleet  than  they  all, 
went  Jasper.  Lady  Montague  met 
them  serenely  in  the  wide  enclosure 
by  the  church.  Once  more  the  circle 
of  dogs  stood  motionless,  noses  to 
gether,  tails  all  wagging  amiably, 
plumed  tail,  bob-tail,  willow  tail, 
screw-tail,  and  the  rag-tag  tail  of  our 
Jasper. 

People  were  still  going  into  churche 
As  Margaret  and  her  friends  came 
pounding  along,  they  thought  fever 
ishly  of  those  quiet  old  days  when 
they  used  to  go  to  Vespers  them 
selves.  But  even  upon  holy  ground, 
the  Airedale  must  be  captured.  Into 
the  circle  of  dogs  dashed  Margaret, 
seizing  the  startled  Jasper  by  two 
handfuls  of  his  wiry  wool. 
66 


RETRIEVING  THE  AIREDALE 

Then  she  turned  a  heated  coun 
tenance  to  her  friends.  "Go  into 
church,"  said  she  solemnly.  "All  I 
have  to  do  now  is  to  take  Jasper 
home.  I  shall  be  with  you  in  ten 
minutes." 

They  obeyed,  protesting. 

"Come,  Jasper,"  said  Margaret  in 
disciplinary  monotone,  a  persuasive 
hand  upon  his  collar. 

She  stood  aside  politely  to  let 
Judge  and  Mrs.  Granger  pass  into 
divine  worship,  and  then  she  set  off 
across  the  lawn  dragging  her  lion 
couchant  beside  her  over  the  frozen 
crust.  At  the  gate  he  rose  with  a  jerk, 
rampant  —  and  his  collar  slipped  off 
in  her  hand. 

Oh,  dogs  can  laugh  —  wild  mirth, 
an  ecstasy  of  humor.  Down  the  long 
67 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

hill  they  flew,  hysterical  with  glee; 
Mike  and  the  Admiral  and  Terence 
in  the  rear,  Lady  Montague  and 
Jasper  well  ahead. 

Margaret  set  her  teeth.  She  was 
accountable  to  Geoffrey  for  Jasper's 
safe  convoy.  She  had  vague,  ascetic 
visions  of  following,  following,  still 
whistling  morbidly,  until  she  died. 
With  the  warm  collar  still  in  hand, 
she  toiled  on  gloomily,  now  at  a  foot 
pace,  now  at  a  moderate  trot.  The 
term  "Dog-trot"  can  assume  a  rich 
ness  of  significance  not  always  ap 
parent.  In  a  sketchy,  canine  way, 
they  mapped  the  whole  township  and 
all  its  rural  routes,  returning  at  last 
by  early  star-rise  down  the  west  road 
to  the  home  neighborhood  again. 

Here  Margaret  had  an  inspiration. 
68 


RETRIEVING  THE  AIREDALE 

Going  to  the  door  of  the  High-School 
principal,  she  rang  the  bell. 

"Would  you  be  willing,"  said  she, 
"to  see  if  you  can  call  Terence?  If 
all  the  rest  of  these  dogs  would  go 
home,  I  might  be  able  to  catch 
Jasper." 

A  house-to-house  canvass  of  all  the 
dog-owners  she  made,  with  conscien 
tious  thoroughness.  She  roused  them 
all,  even  Judge  Granger's  distin 
guished  son.  He  greeted  her  appeal 
with  a  roar  of  frivolous  gayety,  but 
he  called  Lady  Montague. 

"Shall  I  call  Mike  too?"  he  in 
quired.  "The  minister  and  my  father 
are  staying  for  a  committee  meeting 
after  Vespers." 

" Vespers"  thought  Margaret. 

"Yes,  call  him,"  she  said.  "Do." 
69 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

This  left  only  Jasper.  He  flitted 
briskly  up  the  embankment  near 
our  neighbor's  house,  and  dared  her 
to  come  near.  She  glanced  over  at 
our  own  home.  There  was  a  light  in 
Geoffrey's  room.  With  parched  lips 
she  whistled  the  family  whistle.  Up 
went  the  window. 

"Geoffrey,"  said  Margaret  mildly, 
"Jasper  got  out.  He  won't  come  in." 

"Why  don't  you  whistle  for  him?" 
suggested  the  tranquil  Geoffrey. 

Margaret  walked  stonily  into  the 
house,  and  met  her  brother  in  the 
hall. 

"Here,"  she  said  bitterly,  "here  is 
Jasper's  collar.  You  whistle." 

A    moment    later,    Geoffrey    and 
Jasper  came  in,  hand  in  hand,  and  sat 
down  before  the  fire. 
70 


RETRIEVING  THE  AIREDALE 

"Geoffrey,"  said  Margaret  gently, 
after  a  thoughtful  pause,  "when  did 
Uncle  Tyler  say  we  might  let  Jasper 
run?" 

"As  soon  as  he's  seen  the  country." 

Margaret  looked  at  Jasper,  and 
Jasper,  cocking  one  eyebrow,  looked 
at  her. 

"Well,"  said  Margaret,  "he  has." 


VI 

ENDIGOTT  AND  I  REDUCE 

NDICOTT  had  been  read 
ing  a  book  on  diet.  It  told 
how  to  "Feast  and  be 
Slim."  There  are  nearly 


two  hundred  pounds  of  Endicott.  The 
last  time  he  was  measured  for  a  suit, 
he  asked  me  with  some  uneasiness  if 
I  had  noticed  that  he  was  acquiring 
as  to  waist-line  what  our  son  Geof 
frey  calls  a  "presence."  A  man  with  a 
presence,  says  Geoffrey,  must  have  a 
remarkable  profile  and  a  lofty  man 
ner,  or  look  like  Tammany;  likewise 
the  Globe  Man.  Endicott  knew  that 
as  far  as  looks  were  concerned  he 
could  well  afford  a  presence.  He  was 
72 


WE  REDUCE 

tired,  anyway,  of  being  taken  for  a 
minister,  and  the  Globe  Man  would 
be  a  change.  But  the  author  of 
"Feast  and  be  Slim"  had  made  a 
great  point  of  the  spare  figure  for  its 
own  sake.  Endicott  said  that  he  was 
going  to  diet,  according  to  the  plan 
laid  down  by  the  author  of  Feast. 

I  at  once  offered  to  plan  the  meals 
with  this  in  mind. 

"No,"  said  Endicott,  "part  of  this 
chap's  idea  is  that  you  select  from 
the  natural  family  meal  only  the  part 
most  suitable  to  your  purpose.  It 
makes  no  trouble  for  the  rest  of 
the  family.  Don't  give  it  another 
thought." 

I  said  nothing,  but  I  knew  where 
he  kept  the  book.  I  read  it.  Then  I 
had  a  talk  with  the  maid.  The  family 
73 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

meals  I  left  unabridged,  but  there 
were  certain  non-carbohydrates  rec 
ommended  in  the  book.  These  I  or 
dered  in  abundance.  At  least  my  hus 
band  should  not  starve. 

"No  butter?"  said  Barbara  to  her 
father  at  breakfast  next  morning. 

"No,"  said  Endicott  with  quiet 
dignity.  "  I  am  going  to  be  abstemi 
ous  for  a  few  weeks." 

"Abstemious"  has  always  been  a 
cherished  word  with  Endicott,  but 
the  children  are  used  to  hearing  it 
only  when  the  food  in  question  is  not 
popular  with  the  head  of  the  house. 
Barbara  looked  at  the  butter,  and 
tasted  a  crumb  of  it  daintily  at  the 
tip  of  a  bit  of  bread.  Then  she 
watched  her  father,  who  was  thought 
fully  munching  a  dry  portion  of  ce« 
74 


WE  REDUCE 

real  garnished  with  Malaga  grapes. 
Then  Barbara  looked  at  Geoffrey, 
and  then  she  went  on  with  her 
breakfast. 

"Is  he  really  planning  to  feast  and 
be  slim?"  The  door  had  hardly  closed 
after  the  departing  men  when  Bar 
bara  had  me  by  the  arm.  "Because  if 
he  is,  he  won't.  The  book 's  been  in 
his  newspaper  pile  for  a  week,  and  I 
have  read  it  through."  Barbara,  quite 
satisfied,  trailed  through  the  door. 
"He  took  the  car  to  the  office  this 
morning,"  she  called  back  from  the 
stairs.  "The  book  says  you  must 
exercise,"  she  added,  and  vanished. 

That  evening  when  the  children 
were  out,  Endicott,  setting  his  eye 
glasses    astride    his    ancestral    nose, 
looked  at  me  over  his  paper. 
75 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

"I  must  exercise  regularly  in  con 
nection  with  this  diet,"  said  he,  "or 
when  my  weight  disappears  I  shall 
be  more  or  less  haggard.  The  general 
constitution  must  be  kept  up."  Endi- 
cott  laid  a  hickory  log  on  the  and 
irons.  "I  've  ordered  a  fresh  load  of 
wood,"  he  went  on,  "and  when  it 
comes,  Andrews  will  dump  it  in  a 
different  part  of  the  cellar.  I  told  him 
how.  Don't  have  it  on  your  mind." 
Endicott  went  out  into  the  hall  and 
returned  with  both  hands  full. 

"I  knew  that  the  children  were 
going  out,"  said  he  genially,  "and  I 
thought  that  some  candy  would  be 
pleasant.  We  have  n't  eaten  our  old- 
fashioned  candy  and  peanuts  by 
ourselves  for  some  time."  He  handed 
me  my  bag  of  peanuts  and  a  generous 
76 


WE  REDUCE 

newspaper  for  my  shells,  and  took 
out  his  knife  to  cut  the  ribbon  on  the 
candy  box. 

"But  — "  I  hesitated.  Here  were 
the  symbols  of  our  rare  irresponsible 
revels  together.  To  intrude  at  such 
a  moment  a  question  of  the  flesh! 
"Your  diet,  you  know — "  I  said  it 
gently  with  an  inquiring  inflection. 

Endicott  was  pouring  his  peanuts 
into  his  newspaper,  and  he  paused 
halfway.  "I  didn't  think,"  said  he. 
"Of  course  they  do  expect  you  to 
diet  between  meals,  don't  they?" 
He  pondered.  Then  he  poured  the 
rest  of  the  peanuts.  "I  have  n't  fairly 
begun  to  diet  yet.  We  '11  call  to-day 
an  experimental  trial,  and  begin  tech 
nically  to-morrow  morning." 

I    have    always    been    glad    that 

77 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

Endicott  was  of  a  legal  turn  of  mind. 
As  the  wife  of  one  of  the  elders  of  the 
bar,  I  have  always  felt  secure. 

The  next  afternoon  I  walked  into  our 
front  drive  in  time  to  seeAndrews's 
wood-wagon  disappearing  down  the 
street.  With  housewifely  interest  I 
went  to  the  cellar  stairs  to  see  if 
everything  had  been  locked  up  prop 
erly.  Some  one  was  in  the  cellar.  It 
was  Endicott.  His  cane  leaned  against 
the  arm  of  the  old  rocking-chair  in 
which  he  sat.  The  load  of  wood  had 
been  deposited  in  the  bulkhead,  and 
Endicott,  conveniently  seated  in  a 
chair  and  a  draft,  was  busily  aiming 
stick  after  stick  at  the  corner  where 
the  wood  always  goes.  I  sat  down  on 
the  top  stair  and  waved  at  him 
sociably. 

78 


WE  REDUCE 

"I  am  exercising,"  said  Endicott. 
"I  told  Andrews  to  have  the  wood 
dumped  here  for  me  to  pitch.  He  said 
that  you  liked  to  have  the  door  of  the 
bulkhead  locked,  and  I  'm  getting  the 
worst  of  it  out  of  the  way." 

"Yes,"  said  I,  "but  we  're  going  out 
to  dinner.  It 's  five  now." 

Endicott  handed  me  indulgently  up 
the  stairs.  "When  we  get  home,"  said 
he,  "I  '11  pitch  enough  more  so  that 
we  can  lock  the  door  for  the  night. 
No  burglar  will  take  the  trouble  to 
climb  through  that  pile  this  evening." 

He  went  to  his  room  and  I  heard 
him  telephoning.  I  wanted  that  door 
locked.  I  seized  a  bushel  basket  and 
flew  to  the  pile.  Basket  after  basket 
went  busily  into  the  corner.  I  had  to 
work  silently;  I  longed  to  work  faster. 
79 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

I  had  not  realized  that  the  pile  was  so 
large.  My  head  was  just  beneath  the 
bulkhead  door,  when  suddenly  the 
leaves  of  the  roof  parted  above  me, 
and  I  looked  up  into  the  astonished 
eyes  of  Andrews. 

"Mr.  Avery  telephoned  to  me  just 
now,"  gasped  Andrews,  recovering. 
"He  told  me  to  pitch  in  the  wood." 
Andrews  is  a  man  of  poise.  He  had 
taken  my  basket  and  was  at  work. 
Thoughtfully  I  went  upstairs  to  dress. 

The  next  day  Endicott  arrived  at 
the  house  with  a  chest-exerciser,  a 
mechanism  of  weights  and  springs 
and  handles,  and  a  clamp  by  which 
to  affix  it  to  the  study  wall.  Endicott 
does  not  need  an  increased  chest 
development.  All  that  he  needs  is  an 
arrested  presence.  But  the  chest- 
80 


WE  REDUCE 

exerciser  was  warmly  recommended 
by  the  books.  The  results  were  to  be 
a  matter  of  persistence,  merely. 

For  the  next  few  weeks  it  was  no 
such  simple  matter  to  cater  for  Endi- 
cott.  One  could  never  tell  when  he 
might  suspend  his  training  and  call 
for  the  fat  of  the  land.  The  maid 
would  inquire  delicately,  "And  do  ye 
know,  ma'am,  will  he  be  dieting 
to-day?"  As  time  went  on,  these 
seasons  of  reprieve  were  extended 
enough  to  amount  to  a  furlough.  I 
heard  him  tell  Geoffrey  in  confidence 
that  he  had  lost  approximately  a 
gramme  a  fortnight. 

He  gained,  however,  in  other  ways. 

The  methods,  the  terms,  the  ideals, 

and  caprices  of  a  new  cult  had  become 

familiar  to  him.   He  had  collected 

81 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

quite  an  impressive  set  of  apparatus 
and  had  learned  to  use  it  all.  No 
marksman  could  have  protested  more 
hotly  against  the  removal  of  the  stag's 
antlers  from  the  mantel  than  Endi- 
cott  against  the  removal  of  his  chest- 
exerciser  from  his  study  wall.  It  will 
always  remain  there,  a  trophy  of 
great  days. 

"You  never  use  it,"  objected 
Barbara. 

"How  do  you  know  when  I  use 
it?"  inquired  her  father  with  some 
severity. 

"Because  it  squeaks,"  said  Barbara. 

In  the  meantime,  I  was  really  re 
ducing.  Admiring  Endicott's  large- 
hearted  way  of  sharing  his  ambition, 
I  nevertheless  shrank  from  telling 
about  my  own  experiences,  though  I 
82 


WE  REDUCE 

was  making  a  striking  success  at  it. 
I  still  shrink.  The  matronly  woman 
who  decides  to  go  into  training  has 
her  humorous  moments.  Just  one 
princely  soul  I  discovered  who  did 
not  laugh  at  my  ambitions.  His  fine 
tact  would  have  adorned  queens' 
palaces.  I  was  on  my  weekly  trip  to 
weigh  myself  on  the  naturalization 
scales  at  the  court-house  when  I 
came  upon  Endicott  and  his  partner 
there,  in  earnest  consultation.  I  could 
not  retreat;  I  would  not  dissemble.  I 
stepped  upon  the  scales.  "Mr.  Taft 
and  I,"  said  I  casually,  "have  decided 
to  reduce." 

The  princely  one  bowed  gravely. 
"If  you  really  care  to  reduce,"  said 
he,  "I  wish  you  success." 

Both  those  gallant  men  nobly  re- 
83 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

frained  from  going  near  the  scales. 
There  are  times  when  one  has  a  deep 
appreciation  for  these  graceful  little 
amenities  of  omission. 

In  general,  however,  I  cannot  say 
that  I  found  people  ideally  sensitive 
to  the  beauty  of  my  enterprise. 
Geoffrey  found  a  gloomy  sort  of 
pleasure  in  calling  me  Susannah  di 
Milo.  He  brought  me  boxes  of  candy, 
arguing  that  if  he  presented  it  I 
would  have  to  eat  it  out  of  mere 
politeness.  Firmly,  with  much  the 
same  feelings  that  I  had  when  I 
taught  him  not  to  take  mice  and 
turtles  to  his  room,  I  now  trained  my 
son  not  to  bring  me  candy.  Floral 
tributes,  fruit,  music,  and  jewels  I 
would  accept;  but  candy,  popcorn, 
and  peanuts  I  gave  to  the  poor. 
84 


WE  REDUCE 

I  have  grown  reasonably  thin. 
But  I  wish  now  that  in  my  years  of 
abundance  I  had  taken  more  com 
fort.  I  am  impatient  now  as  never 
before  with  the  callow  distaste  for 
anything  but  the  most  regulation 
fashion-plated  figure.  What  else  ap 
pears  so  tragic  in  Arnold  Bennett's 
stories  as  the  irrevocable  way  in 
which  his  heroines  grow  middle-aged 
and  fat,  fat  and  old;  fat  and  helpless? 
I  rebel,  now  that  I  can  rebel  grace 
fully.  The  most  gracious  memories  in 
my  life  chance  to  concern  old  age 
grown  comfortable;  matronly  women 
who  were  wide-bosomed  and  firm  of 
poise;  certain  ample  dresses  with 
folds  and  folds  of  softness;  gentle 
aunts  and  grandmothers  whose  shoul 
ders  were  not  sharp.  I  cannot  find  it 
85 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

all  unlovely,  this  tendency  of  people 
to  gather  substance  with  the  years. 
Our  modern  ambition  to  keep  a 
normal  figure  is  unquestionably  a 
wholesome  thing.  But  I  deplore  ex 
tremes  of  fashion.  Are  we  in  danger 
of  narrowing  our  minds  with  our 
silhouettes?  We  must  not  forget  the 
quiet  serenity  which  oftenest  seems 
to  belong  to  women  who  are  large, 
nor  the  sense  of  peace  and  hearthside 
calm  that  we  feel  when  we  are  with 
them.  After  all,  the  sylph-like  figure 
will  never  seem  just  right  for  holding 
a  tired  little  boy  at  bedtime  until  he 
goes  to  sleep. 

Oh,   well!   I   am  glad  that  I  re 
duced.    I    like    a    trim    shadow    on 
the  sidewalk,  and  I  like  my  narrow 
sleeves.  It  is  pleasant  to  know  that 
86 


WE  REDUCE 

this  matter  of  the  flesh  is  under  our 
control,  and  I  wish  that  I  had  known 
it  twenty  years  ago.  I  think  that  even 
Endicott  could  afford  a  less  com 
manding  presence.  As  soon  as  cold 
weather  comes  he  is  planning  once 
more  to  reduce.  With  a  certain  blend 
of  anxiety  and  wifely  awe,  I  am  await 
ing  the  abstemious  days  to  come. 
The  chest-exerciser  and  the  wood 
pile  also  wait,  gathering  dust  and 
cobwebs.  And  if  his  grammes  do  not 
appreciably  decrease,  I  shall  not  care, 
nor  yet  be  much  surprised. 


VII 
THE  AMATEUR  CHESSMAN 


NY  game  of  chance  or  skill 
has  its  element  of  sym 
bolism.  The  more  highly 
developed  the  game,  the 
more  striking  its  parallel  to  life.  The 
home  run,  the  goal,  the  hitting  of  the 
mark,  the  taking  of  a  trick,  the  throw 
of  the  dice  —  all  these  have  become 
figurative  terms,  not  alone  because 
they  are  picturesque  of  themselves,  but 
because  they  dramatize  experience. 

Of  all  games  in  the  world,  the  most 
allegorical  is  chess.  For  this  reason, 
Barbara  selected  it  as  the  last  hope 
for  her  sister  Margaret.  She  thought 
it  a  pity  for  any  person  to  go  through 
88 


THE  AMATEUR  CHESSMAN 

a  world  of  games  and  to  remain  a 
hardened  Philistine  and  self-confessed 
outsider  as  Margaret  was  doing.  She 
felt  sure  that  her  sister  would  respond 
to  the  charm  and  symbolism  of  play 
ing  if  only  the  matter  could  once  be 
presented  to  her  in  the  proper  form. 

Margaret  had  hitherto  been  entirely 
impervious.  Our  family  divides  rather 
naturally  into  partnerships  in  games. 
Endicott  and  I  play  best  together, 
because  he  requires  a  partner  with 
sufficient  authority  and  force  of  char 
acter  to  center  his  attention  on  the 
progress  of  the  game.  Barbara  and 
Geoffrey  make  a.  keen  and  deter 
mined  pair  of  opponents  for  us,  their 
intuitions  responsive,  their  tastes  in 
brilliant  ventures  well  matched.  But 
Margaret  long  since  gave  herself  up 
89 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

as  hopeless.  She  admires  all  sorts  of 
games  in  a  distant  fashion,  but  when 
forced  to  take  an  active  part  she  has 
a  way  of  succumbing  at  critical  mo 
ments  as  if  from  a  species  of  shell- 
shock,  and  must  be  led  tactfully  from 
the  field.  She  shows  her  good-will  by 
sitting  near  us  when  we  play,  and 
by  answering  the  telephone  and  the 
doorbell  when  they  ring. 

Barbara  cannot  reconcile  herself  to 
this  deficiency  in  one  so  near  of  kin. 
It  was  in  a  moment  of  extreme  des 
peration  that  she  hit  upon  chess  as 
just  the  thing  for  Margaret.  The 
presence  of  only  two  players  at  the 
board  ought  in  itself  to  be  soothing. 
The  long  intervals  of  deliberation 
between  moves  should  relieve  nerv 
ous  tension,  and  the  picturesque  ap- 
90 


THE  AMATEUR  CHESSMAN 

pearance  of  the  chessmen  would  mean 
while  capture  the  imagination. 

Margaret  was  docile.  She  conscien 
tiously  learned  the  moves  from  the 
encyclopaedia,  and  the  traditions  from 
Morphy's  Manual,  and  sat  down  to 
the  game  with  an  attitude  of  pale 
determination  that  went  to  the  hearts 
of  those  who  knew  her. 

In  Margaret's  hands,  chess  became 
allegorical,  indeed.  The  thoroughly 
helpless  amateur  can  find  three  pleas 
ures  in  the  royal  game  which  to  Mr. 
Morphy  immortality  itself  shall  not 
restore;  three  pleasures:  a  fresh  de 
light  in  the  personality  of  the  various 
chessmen;  the  recklessness  of  un 
certain  and  irresponsible  moves;  and 
the  unprecedented  thrill  of  check 
mating  the  opposing  king  by  accident. 
91 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

The  expert,  it  is  true,  may  some* 
times  retain  through  life  a  personal 
appreciation  of  the  characters  of  the 
pieces:  the  conservative  habits  of  the 
king;  the  politic,  sidelong  bishop;  the 
stout  little  plodding  pawns.  But  since 
the  days  of  his  forgotten  apprentice 
ship,  Mr.  Morphy  has  not  known 
their  many-sided  natures.  To  the  true 
expert  the  pieces  on  the  board  have 
become  subject  people;  as  far  as  inde 
pendence  of  purpose  goes,  they  might 
as  well  all  be  pawns.  With  a  novice, 
on  the  contrary,  the  men  and  women 
of  the  chessboard  display  their  indi 
viduality  and  their  Old  World  ca 
prices,  their  mediaeval  greatness  of 
heart.  Like  Aragon  and  the  Plantag- 
enets,  they  have  magnificent  leisure 
for  the  purposeless  and  daring  quest 
92 


THE  AMATEUR  CHESSMAN 

The  stiff,  circular  eyes  of  the  simple 
boxwood  knight  stare  casually  about 
him  as  he  goes.  Irresponsibly  he 
twists  among  his  enemies,  now  draw 
ing  rein  in  the  cross-country  path  of 
the  angry  bishop,  now  blowing  his 
horn  at  the  very  drawbridge  of  the 
king.  It  is  no  cheap  impunity  that  he 
faces  in  his  errant  hardihood.  Mar 
garet's  knights  often  die  in  harness, 
all  unshriven.  That  risk  lends  unfail 
ing  zest  for  excursions  into  the  ene 
my's  country.  Most  of  all  she  loves 
her  gentle  horsemen. 

She  is  also  very  loyal  to  the  bishop. 
One  evening  Barbara  accidentally 
imperiled  her  queen.  Only  the  oppos 
ing  bishop  needed  to  be  sacrificed 
to  capture  her.  The  spectators  were 
breathless  at  her  certain  fate.  But 

93 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

Margaret  esteems  the  stately  bishop. 
Rather  this  man  saved  for  defense 
than  risked  for  such  a  captive.  The 
bishop  withdrew,  and  the  queen  went 
on  her  destructive  way. 

Of  all  the  men  the  one  who  least 
concerns  Margaret  is  the  king.  She 
considers  him  a  non-committal  mon 
arch  at  best.  At  times,  imperial  and 
menacing,  he  may  conquer,  with 
goodly  backing  from  his  yeomen,  his 
wife,  and  his  chivalry.  Sometimes, 
and  far  more  often,  he  is  like  Lear, 
his  royal  guard  cut  down,  no  longer 
terrible  in  arms.  And  at  his  death  he 
likes  to  send  urgently  for  his  bishop, 
who  is  solacing  though  powerless  to 
save.  Whenever  Margaret  sees  that 
her  king  is  surely  about  to  lose  his 
head,  she  uses  her  last  move  to  bring 
94 


THE  AMATEUR  CHESSMAN 

the  bishop  hurrying  to  his  side. 
Endicott,  chancing  to  pass  by  the 
board  one  night  just  as  Margaret 
made  this  ceremonial  move,  paused 
to  reason  with  her  about  it.  He  re 
fused  to  see  the  beauty  of  this  pious 
return  of  the  out-bound  bishop  at 
the  last  battle-cry  of  the  king.  But 
Margaret  still  believes  that  a  move 
may  well  be  wasted  to  the  end  that 
everything  may  happen  decently  and 
in  order. 

In  fact,  as  time  went  on  and  Mar 
garet's  codes  became  more  and  more 
complicated,  Barbara  began  to  feel 
that  the  emphasis  upon  the  symbol 
ism  of  the  game  was  capable  of  being 
over-stressed.  She  hated  to  think 
that  her  sister's  methods  in  life  would 
be  as  irrational  and  as  unprincipled 
95 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

as  her  moves  in  chess.  For  Marga 
ret's  gambits  in  general  are  character 
ized  by  a  grand  disregard  for  conse 
quences.  Let  her  men  rush  forth  to 
the  edge  of  the  hostile  country.  Once 
there,  there  will  be  time  enough  to 
peer  around  and  reconnoiter  and  see 
what  they  can  see.  Meanwhile,  the 
enemy  is  battering  gloriously  at  the 
postern  gate,  but  at  least  the  fight  is 
on. 

Part  of  the  recklessness  of  these 
opening  moves  consists  in  the  fact 
that  the  girls  are  on  such  confidential 
terms. 

"This  need  not  worry  you  at  pres 
ent,"  says  Margaret,  planting  her 
castle  on  an  unprotected  crag.  "I'm 
only  putting  it  there  in  case." 

That  sort  of  thing  saves  a  great 
96 


THE  AMATEUR  CHESSMAN 

deal  of  time.  Barbara  might  other 
wise  have  found  it  necessary  to 
waste  long  minutes  trying  to  fathom 
the  unknowable  of  the  scheme.  With 
out  this  companionable  interchange, 
chess  is  the  most  lonely  of  human 
experiences.  There  you  sit,  solitary 
and  unsignaled  —  a  point  of  thought, 
a  center  of  calculation.  You  have  no 
partner.  The  world  is  canceled  for 
the  time,  except,  perched  opposite 
you,  another  hermit  intellect,  sitting 
remote  and  sinister.  Oh,  no!  The 
amateur  should  be  allowed  to  discuss 
his  plots! 

I  have  often  thought  that  strange 
clues  to  character  appear  around  the 
friendly  chessboard.  There  is  the 
supposedly  neutral  onlooker  who  can 
not  possibly  remain  neutral  while  he 
97 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

murmurs  warnings  or  laments  the 
ill-judged  moves.  Without  him  how 
tame  both  life  and  chess  would  be. 
There  is  the  stout-hearted  player  who 
refuses  to  resign  though  his  defeat  is 
demonstrably  certain,  but  continues 
to  jog  about  the  board,  eluding  actual 
capture.  In  life,  would  he  resign? 
There  is  the  player  who  gives  little 
shrieks  at  unexpected  attacks;  the 
player  who  explains  his  mistakes  and 
describes  what  he  intended  to  do 
instead;  the  player  who  makes  no 
sign  whatever  of  gloating  or  despair. 
Most  striking  of  all  is  the  behavior 
of  people  when  they  face  the  necessity 
of  playing  against  their  own  past 
mistakes.  A  wrong  move  can  never 
be  retracted  by  the  thoroughbred. 
No  apology,  no  retracing  of  the  path; 

98 


THE  AMATEUR  CHESSMAN 

no  attempt  to  "be  the  architect  of 
the  irrevocable  past";  the  playing 
must  go  on  as  if  the  consequences 
were  part  of  the  plan.  Indeed,  the 
game  is  allegorical,  with  its  checkered 
board  and  far  crusades. 

In  my  mind,  however,  the  final 
test  of  true  insight  is  the  degree 
in  which  a  person  can  enjoy  the  end 
of  a  game  of  chess  when  he  is  the 
defeated  player.  Checkmate,  of  all 
human  inventions,  is  the  most  per 
fect  type  of  utter  finality.  In  other 
conclusions  there  is  something  left 
ragged,  something  in  abeyance.  Here 
there  is  no  shading,  no  balancing  of 
the  scales.  The  victor  wins  not  by 
majority  as  in  cards;  success  or  failure 
is  unanimous.  There  was  one  ballot, 
and  that  is  cast.  No  matter  how 
99 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

faulty  the  playing  that  went  before, 
the  end  of  a  game  of  chess  is  always 
perfect.  That  is  why  the  game  so 
fascinates  the  imagination.  Out  of  its 
austere  antiquity  comes  one  beautiful 
gift  for  the  most  hopeless  amateur; 
at  least  he  can  be  perfectly  defeated. 
The  quiet  fatalism  of  it  is  as  perfect 
for  him  as  for  the  Chinese  wizard 
centuries  ago  playing  with  amber 
chessmen.  It  is  as  complete  as  for 
the  ancient  Persian  who  thought  of 
the  magical  final  phrase:  Shah-mat! 
Checkmate!  The  king  is  dead. 


VIII 
ENDICOTT  AND  I  GO  FISHING 


NDICOTT  and  I  fully  ap 
preciate  the  discrepancy 
between  our  manner  of 
taking  a  fishing  trip,  and 
all  the  instinctive  tendencies  of  well- 
ordered  couples.  We  are  not  artistic 
about  it.  We  have  no  startling  theories 
about  it,  nor  any  quarrel  with  the  hab 
its  of  other  fishermen.  We  frankly  ad 
mire  the  fine  art  of  Henry  van  Dyke's 
masterly  fishing  of  "Little  Rivers," 
and  we  have  read  with  chuckling 
appreciation  Bliss  Perry's  exposi 
tion  of  the  crackling-underbrush-and- 
hip-rubber-boots  delights  of  "fishing 
with  a  worm."  We  are  neither  skill- 
101 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

ful  fly-fishers  like  Van  Dyke,  nor 
as  fearlessly  close  to  nature  as  Mr. 
Perry.  We  violate,  moreover,  the 
cardinal  rule  of  fishermen.  It  is  well 
known  that  the  unexpected  lure  of 
watery  spring  sunlight,  suggestive 
of  red-winged  blackbirds  and  pussy 
willows,  or  perhaps  the  chance  sound 
of  a  bluebird's  distant  warble,  should 
be  the  proper  motive  force  which 
should  put  into  the  fisher-heart  an 
irresistible  craving  for  the  trout-run, 
and  should  constrain  him  to  drop  all 
engagements  to  wander  through  dan 
delion  lanes  to  cowslip-covered  tus 
socks  in  some  far  cranberry  bog.  In 
the  face  of  this  tradition,  settled, 
middle-aged  couple  that  we  are,  we 
arrange  our  fishing  trips  beforehand. 
Endicott  plans  not  more  carefully 
102 


WE  GO  FISHING 

for  his  Short  Calendar  nor  I  more 
systematically  for  my  best  dinner 
party  than  we  both  together  settle 
the  details  of  our  day  at  the  farm. 

Therefore,  when  the  six  o'clock  sun 
light  brightened  the  dewdrops  on  the 
rambler  roses  outside  our  dining-room 
window  one  glorious  July  morning, 
we  had  no  adventuresome  thrill  at 
the  thought  of  duties  to  be  deserted 
as  we  accepted  the  parting  attentions 
of  the  children.  The  family  lunch- 
basket,  knobby  with  tin  cups  and 
sandwiches,  was  ready.  Our  six-quart 
pail  and  our  frying-pan  leaned  socia 
bly  against  the  front  doorstep.  Bar 
bara  laid  near  them  a  pile  of  crisp 
kindling-wood  —  Endicott  and  I  have 
had  experience  with  impromptu  twigs 
and  bark  which  ought  to  be  inflam- 
103 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

mable  —  and  Geoffrey  added  a  large 
tin  box  labeled  "Medium  Screws," 
chivalrously  resisting  the  temptation 
to  give  it  more  than  one  small  sugges 
tive  shake  for  the  benefit  of  his  sisters. 

No  possible  item  of  equipment  was 
lacking,  when,  arrayed  for  our  trip, 
we  ascended  the  lofty  step  of  the 
two-seated  carriage  which  was  to  take 
us  to  the  farm.  Not  that  Endicott  and 
I  cannot  ride  in  a  one-seated  vehicle 
together.  But  with  our  kindling-wood, 
our  frying-pan  and  our  six-quart  pail, 
our  shawls  and  our  hammock,  our 
block  of  ice,  my  tackle  and  the  me 
dium  screws,  we  were  more  comfort 
able  each  with  a  seat  alone. 

So  we  started  out,  with  our  cheer 
fully  rattling  cargo,  leaving  our  chil 
dren  appreciative  spectators  on  the 

104 


WE  GO  FISHING 

front  doorstep.  Endicott  insisted  on 
driving.  He  dislikes  to  drive,  and  I 
can  never  relax  my  spinal  column 
while  he  holds  the  reins.  Moreover,  I 
myself  delight  in  driving,  and  he  feels 
happy  and  secure  in  my  horseman 
ship.  But  Endicott  has  sometimes  an 
ignoble  regard  for  appearances,  within 
city  limits.  Alone  by  ourselves  we  do 
as  we  will,  contrary  to  the  codes  of 
manly  chivalry  and  feminine  help 
lessness.  We  have  tried  family  fishing- 
parties,  but  the  atmosphere  is  ruined. 
Endicott  feels  that  he  must  play  the 
part  of  gallant  spouse  and  indulgent 
patriarch  when  the  children  are  by, 
and  the  girls  expect  me  to  be  a  gra 
cious  out-of-door  Ceres,  aloof  and  ar 
tistic;  and  Ceres,  forsooth,  may  not 
bail  out  a  boat. 

105 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

We  stopped  at  the  fish  market  on 
the  way,  and  Endicott  tucked  a  cool, 
soft  package  of  bluefish  carefully 
against  our  ice  before  we  started 
again.  This  business  was  performed 
in  impressive  silence.  I  have  learned 
to  ignore  the  bluefish  part  of  our 
trips.  It  always  seems  the  most  fla 
grant  incident  of  our  programme  — 
until  lunch-time. 

On  our  journey  we  talked  a  little. 
Alone  with  each  other!  —  we  almost 
felt  obliged  to  be  entertaining.  We 
spoke  of  the  excellent  weather,  of 
our  parting  instructions  to  household 
and  stenographer,  of  the  children  and 
the  town  meeting.  And  Endicott  re 
lated  anecdotes. 

But  once  at  the  old  beaver  lake, 
where  the  twisted  orchard  trees  had 
106 


WE  GO  FISHING 

dropped  their  little  green  apples  into 
the  water  where  they  bobbed  up  and 
down  in  the  ripples  —  when  we  found 
the  hammock  hooks  still  in  the  trees 
where  we  had  left  them,  and  the  old 
flat-bottomed  boat  full  of  the  water 
of  many  rains  —  then  Endicott  and  I 
became  frankly  ourselves,  irrespon 
sible  and  unembarrassed. 

"Let  me  bail  out  the  boat  for  you 
this  time,"  said  Endicott,  turning 
as  he  stood  halfway  up  the  orchard 
slope  with  his  arms  full  of  hammock 
and  shawls.  His  attitude  expressed 
genuine  readiness  to  drop  every  pref 
erence  together  with  his  burden  and 
rush  to  the  pumps  without  delay. 
The  best  part  of  an  independent  feel 
ing  is  the  knowledge  that  at  any 
moment  one  may  resort  to  the  cling- 
107 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

ing-vine  attitude  and  find  a  worthy 
support  whereon  to  twine.  The  ad 
vantages  of  the  married  state  are 
summed  up  for  me  in  my  sensation 
when  Endicott  offers  to  bail  out  my 
boat.  But  no  such  sentimental  ele 
ment  was  in  my  air  as  I  moored  my 
craft  beside  the  nearest  clump  of 
blue-flags  and  perched  firmly  on  the 
highest  seat  with  my  pail  and  my 
sponge.  The  ambition  of  dipping  up 
the  Atlantic  with  a  teacup  is  rendered 
somehow  small  and  unworthy  by  its 
obvious  futility,  while  in  that  boat 
there  seemed  to  be  nearly  as  much  to 
conquer,  but  it  had  been  emptied 
before,  and  there  was  the  joy  of  the 
last  muddy  spongeful  to  look  forward 
to.  So,  crouched  with  skillfully  up- 
gathered  skirts  in  the  prow  of  the 
108 


WE  GO  FISHING 

boat,  I  dipped  and  dipped,  while  the 
bright  splash  of  the  water  over  the 
boatside  stirred  up  the  twinkling 
school  of  minnows  in  the  sun.  A 
stake-driver  flapped  over  and  settled 
in  the  cat-tails,  and  a  kingfisher 
perched  watchfully  on  the  shad-bush 
by  the  dam.  Obviously  a  poor  fishing 
day,  thought  the  kingfisher  and  I, 
with  quizzical  glances  at  each  other; 
but  he  still  swung  on  his  silver-green 
bough,  and  I  whole-heartedly  mopped 
out  the  last  puddles,  jointed  my  rod, 
unreeled  my  line,  and  provided  my 
hook  with  a  well-chosen  medium 
screw. 

I  could  see  Endicott  twisting  in 
the  hammock  to  watch  me  row  across 
the  pond,  and  I  feathered  my  strokes 
as  well  as  the  stiff,  wooden  oarlocks 

109 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

would  allow,  because  Endicott  — 
scrape  went  the  bottom  of  the  boat! 
A  settled  feeling  as  the  crumbling 
stump  whereon  I  was  moored  gave 
way  a  little  to  let  the  boat's  beams 
sink  comfortably  into  it,  a  futile 
lashing  of  the  waves  when  I  tried  to 
push  myself  off  by  backing  water,  or 
to  progress  by  straight  rowing — no 
use!  I  must  pole.  I  poled.  The  dizzy 
sweep  of  my  boat  as  I  gave  the  muddy 
ground  a  vigorous  push  with  my 
brandished  oar  told  me  I  was  free, 
and  I  sat  down  to  row  again.  My 
anchorage  was  as  fast  as  ever.  I  must 
pole  on  the  other  side.  I  poled.  I 
poled  until  I  felt  that  all  my  fishes 
must  be  dizzied  to  docility.  Around 
and  around  I  could  go  with  ease;  any 
tangent  to  the  circle  was  impossible, 
no 


WE  GO  FISHING 

There  are  times  when  solid  founda 
tions  beneath  one's  feet  are  exasper 
ating  instead  of  reassuring. 

I  knew  that  Endicott  was  watch 
ing.  He  has  reached  that  point  of 
perfect  manners  when  he  stands 
firmly  with  his  back  against  such 
stone  walls  as  I  may  wish  to  climb, 
forming  of  himself  a  disinterested  and 
most  convenient  post  for  me  to  snatch 
at  if  I  need  to,  keeping  the  while  a 
dreamy  gaze  on  far-off  landscapes. 
He  talks  to  the  horse  while  I  climb 
into  carriages.  He  did  not  watch  me 
bail  out  the  boat.  But  a  double  time 
of  service  would  be  necessary  to  make 
any  easeful  husband  forego  the  pleas 
ure  of  seeing  his  erstwhile  blithesome 
Frau  a-swing  upon  a  stump  in  a  pond. 
I  had  almost  decided  to  begin  to  fish, 
111 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

thus  giving  him  the  impression  that 
I  had  been  circulating  to  get  my 
bearings  and  to  locate  the  best  fishing- 
holes,  when  I  saw  Endicott  rise  from 
his  hammock.  Ordinarily  I  do  not 
watch  his  exit  from  hammocks, 
though  it  is  a  notable  sight.  Down  to 
the  verge  he  came,  a  modern  Bedi- 
vere.  Was  he  planning  to  swim  out  to 
my  rescue? 

"Ship  ahoy!"  he  called  between  his 
hands.  His  side  whiskers,  I  knew, 
were  a-bristle  with  enjoyment  of  the 
subtle  humor  of  this  remark.  I  re 
sponded  rather  coolly  with  that  fem 
inine  salutation  which  my  daughters 
call  a  "hoo-hoo." 

"Say!   Why   do   you    sit   on   the 
stump?"  he  inquired  impersonally,  in 
carefully  separated  syllables. 
112 


WE  GO  FISHING 

"Can't  move,"  I  shouted,  in  my 
most  carrying  and  formal  woman's 
club  voice. 

"Get  into  the  end  of  the  boat! 
You  're  sitting  on  the  stump,"  he 
roared. 

Almost  I  decided  to  remain  where 
I  was  and  to  fish  with  dignity,  mov 
ing  perhaps  by  degrees  away  from 
the  center  of  gravity  of  my  scow. 
But  the  logic  of  the  situation  was 
too  beautiful  to  be  so  disregarded. 
I  stepped  into  the  stern.  With  dis 
concerting  suddenness  my  shallop 
plunged,  swung  about,  and  floated 
lightly  though  unevenly  upon  the 
waves  once  more.  I  balanced  back 
to  my  rowing-bench  and  paddled  to 
my  favorite  fishing-cove.  The  white 
birches  flickered  in  the  quiet  water 
113 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

while  I  trailed  my  hook  idly  over  the 
edge  of  the  boat.  Small,  radiant  sun- 
fish  came  by  twos  and  threes  and 
floated,  round-eyed,  near  the  bait, 
which  I  twitched  away  from  their 
comical  mouths,  and  waited  for  a 
pout  or  a  pickerel. 

One  might  as  well  look  to  see  the 
rainy  Pleiades  in  the  sunshine  as  a 
pout  on  a  pleasant  day.  When  I  fish 
for  fish,  I  go  with  my  son  in  the 
drizzling  twilight;  on  a  pleasure  trip 
with  Endicott  it  is  as  well,  after  all, 
to  stop  at  the  fish-market.  For  the 
bluefish,  cooked  in  the  intrusive  fry 
ing-pan,  over  our  kindled-by-kin- 
dling-wood  fire,  eaten  from  a  paper 
plate,  was  a  part  of  the  perfection  of 
that  sunny  afternoon;  almost  as  much 
a  part  as  the  singing  of  the  grass- 

114 


WE  GO  FISHING 

hoppers  in  the  daisy-field,  and  the 
quivering  shadows  made  by  the  apple 
leaves  upon  the  grass.  Endicott  and 
I  learn  again  to  talk  to  each  other  on 
our  fishing  trips.  Tradition  helps  us 
there;  we  always  have  talked  under 
that  particular  tree,  and  it  is  easier 
to  open  the  way  again,  perhaps  begin 
ning  where  we  left  off  the  year  before 
when  the  apple  blossoms  were  fall 
ing  on  the  grass  and  the  veery  sang 
where  we  found  the  ovenbird's  nest 
years  ago.  An  afternoon  under  the 
apple  tree,  and  then  another  hour  in 
the  boat,  with  Endicott  to  row,  and 
the  sunset  fading  into  star-rise  —  I 
think  we  were  not  sorry  to  leave  the 
perch  and  the  pickerel  still  in  the 
shadows  around  the  toad-lily  roots, 
when  it  came  time  for  us  to  drive 
115 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 


home  along  the  old  wood  road,  while 
the  cool  mist  came  out  of  the  forest 
where  the  katydids  were  singing,  and 
fireflies  were  dancing  in  the  dark. 


IX 

CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER 
STUDIES 

NDICOTT  is  not  an  ar 
dent  student  of  the  birds 
and  bees.  He  observes 
them  affably  when  we 


point  them  out  to  him,  but  without 
enthusiasm.  The  Agassiz  Clubs  that 
flourished  in  New  England  during  his 
youth  left  him  virtually  untouched, 
except  for  one  single  item  of  nature- 
lore  which  he  did  permanently  retain: 
he  knows  the  Cecropia  Moth.  When 
ever  one  of  us  mentions  having  seen  a 
new  moth  or  butterfly,  Endicott  kin 
dles  with  instant  attention.  "Was  it," 
he  inquires  hopefully,  "a  Cecropia?" 
117 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

I  believe  that  to  know  the  name  of 
one  moth  really  well  is  to  have  the 
key  to  the  enjoyment  of  all  moths. 
In  the  first  place,  the  intellectual 
pleasure  of  classification  is  open. 
Endicott's  mode  of  identifying  moths 
and  butterflies  is  complete  and  simple. 
He  knows  that  any  lepidopterous 
insect  must  be  one  of  two  things;  it 
is  either  Cecropia  or  not-Cecropia. 
Judged  by  every  rule  of  logic,  this 
theory  of  division  is  flawless.  In  the 
second  place,  a  person  who  knows 
one  moth  is  always  in  a  position  to 
add  to  his  knowledge.  Endicott,  to 
be  sure,  never  adds  to  his,  but  if  he 
should  ever  care  to  do  so  he  could 
start  from  the  vantage-point  of  a  life 
long  interest  in  the  subject.  And  in 
the  third  place,  when  occasionally  a 
118 


CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

moth  does  turn  out  to  be  a  Cecropia, 
there  comes  a  moment  of  indescrib 
able  satisfaction,  when  rich  content 
ment  floods  the  spirit;  a  blend  of 
astonishment,  recognition,  rapt  appre 
ciation,  and  proper  pride.  I  know  that 
a  smattering  of  knowledge  is  looked 
down  upon  by  the  thorough  scholar, 
and  that  educators  must  stress  the 
essentials  and  frown  upon  the  super 
ficial;  but  there  are  certain  superfici 
alities  that  arouse  the  spirit  in  a  de 
gree  all  out  of  proportion  to  their 
value.  I  am  sure  that  Endicott  takes 
more  pride  in  his  one  moth  than  he 
ever  took  in  his  ability  to  read  and 
write. 

When  the  children  were  small,  I 
hoped  that  they  might  grow  up  with 
a  fortunate  mental  balance,  nicely 

119 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

adjusted  between  my  own  careful 
habits  of  accurate  information,  and 
Endicott's  sense  of  the  artistic  glam 
our  of  common  things.  I  knew  enough 
about  botany  and  bird-study  to  make 
a  beginning  with  the  children  and 
send  for  hand-books;  I  started  very 
early  to  teach  them  the  names  of 
the  birds  and  flowers.  The  girls  were 
rapid  and  acquisitive  pupils,  keeping 
lists  and  scouring  the  woods  and  using 
an  old  herbarium  of  mine  for  their 
pressed  flowers  and  ferns.  But  Geof 
frey  had  a  scientific  bent  that  was 
none  of  my  planning.  I  had  thought 
that  my  tastes  were  sufficiently 
broad;  I  can  appreciate  the  beauty  of 
the  flowers,  birds,  rocks,  trees,  and 
stars;  —  but  when  it  comes  to  rep 
tiles,  I  draw  the  line.  Doubtless  the 
120 


CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

reptiles  and  water-creatures  demon 
strate  many  phases  of  the  miracle  of 
animate  form;  indeed  I  am  ready  to 
admit  that  they  have  plenty  of  life. 
But  I  hold  that  researches  in  this 
line  can  be  pushed  too  far.  I  ruth 
lessly  trained  both  my  son  and  his 
dog  not  to  bring  home  snakes. 

Turtles,  however,  and  that  small 
species  of  lizards  called  newts,  and 
all  sorts  of  frogs,  were  different.  If 
the  girls  could  collect  the  pitcher- 
plant  and  the  swamp-azalea  in  the 
old  cranberry-bog  at  the  farm,  why 
should  Geoffrey  not  be  allowed  to 
collect  the  snapping  turtle,  the  sala 
mander,  and  the  horned  pout?  He 
kept  them  in  a  tank  sunk  in  the 
ground  just  inside  a  wire  enclosure 
that  had  once  served  as  a  paddock 
121 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

for  the  puppy.  This  gave  the  amphib 
ious  specimens  room  to  range.  One 
afternoon  a  neighbor,  coming  in  to 
look  at  the  collection,  told  the  eight- 
year-old  Geoffrey  that  turtles  lived  a 
hundred  years,  and  that  if  you  carved 
your  name  on  the  shell  and  took  the 
turtle  back  to  the  pond,  your  grand 
children  might  later  on  find  it  and 
recognize  it  as  yours.  The  neighbor 
assured  Geoffrey  that  the  carving  on 
the  shell  would  be  entirely  painless  to 
the  turtle. 

Geoffrey  was  fired  at  once.  He  was 
too  little  to  carve  the  letters  neatly 
himself;  but  in  view  of  my  well- 
known  skill  in  writing  on  birthday 
cakes  with  pink  frosting  at  his  dicta 
tion,  he  now  sought  me  out,  laid  his 
largest  turtle  in  my  lap,  handed  me 
122 


CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

his  sharpest  knife,  and  requested  an 
inscription. 

At  times  I  have  found  it  a  strain 
to  live  up  to  my  son's  estimate  of  my 
talents.  Anybody  who  has  seen  an 
immense  gray  turtle  stretch  out  his 
serious  head  and  look  back  over  his 
shoulder  to  watch  an  intruding  en 
graver  at  work  upon  his  roof,  will 
remember  that  a  turtle's  eyes  can 
take  on  an  expression  of  mild  rebuke. 
I  felt  bound  by  the  codes  of  sports 
manship  to  finish  the  initials  I  had 
begun,  but  I  explained  to  Geoffrey 
that  I  could  no  longer  bear  to  face  the 
eye  of  that  turtle.  Geoffrey,  with 
immediate  inspiration,  got  a  news 
paper,  rolled  it  up  in  the  shape  of  a 
funnel,  and  held  it  over  the  turtle's 
head  until  I  finished  my  carving.  It 
123 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

looked  like  an  ether-cone,  but  it 
served  its  purpose  in  shielding  me 
from  the  coldness  of  the  turtle's  gaze. 
The  next  step  was  to  take  the 
turtle  back  to  the  pond.  Geoffrey 
decided  to  make  a  clean  sweep  of  his 
whole  collection,  return  everything 
to  the  pond,  and  catch  some  fresh 
newts.  Therefore  one  afternoon  in 
April  he  and  three  other  little  boys 
set  out  on  a  pilgrimage  to  Duck's 
Pond.  Geoffrey  carried  a  fishing- 
creel  full  of  turtles,  and  a  tin  pail  full 
of  newts.  He  also  took  his  long- 
handled  dip-net  with  which  to  catch 
more  newts  at  the  pond.  On  their 
way  the  boys  saw  a  grocer's  wagon 
overtaking  them,  and  decided  to 
hook  a  ride  to  the  bridge.  Up  went 
the  three  friends  like  monkeys,  and 
124 


CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

up  went  Geoffrey.  But  his  leap  was 
complicated  by  the  dip-net.  The  long 
pole  hit  against  the  wheel,  and 
twitched  him  neatly  out  of  the  wagon, 
landing  him  flat  on  his  face  in  the 
road.  Turtles  flew  in  every  direction. 
Rivers  of  newts  flooded  the  highway. 
The  kind  grocery  man  turned  back, 
helped  to  collect  all  these  scattered 
passengers,  lent  Geoffrey  a  handker 
chief  to  mop  his  wounded  face,  and 
hoisted  him  and  his  aboard. 

But  that  afternoon  was  not  one 
of  Geoffrey's  lucky  days.  The  boys 
found  that  their  path  through  the 
woods  to  the  old  pond  was  inter 
rupted  by  a  little  rivulet  which  the 
spring  rains  had  swollen  to  a  wide 
stream.  One  of  the  hundred  uses  of  a 
dip-net  is  its  convenience  as  a  vault- 
125 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

ing-pole.  If  you  plant  the  end  of  the 
handle  in  the  middle  of  the  stream, 
take  a  good  flying  leap,  and  keep  a 
steady  hold,  it  lands  you  lightly  on 
the  other  brink.  One  by  one  the  boys 
flew  over,  and  then  came  Geoffrey's 
turn.  As  a  precautionary  measure  he 
emptied  his  fishing-creel  of  turtles 
and  ladled  them  in  the  dip-net  across 
the  stream  to  his  friends  who  received 
them  on  the  other  bank.  Then,  skill 
fully  balancing  his  pail  of  lizards  in 
his  free  hand,  he  grasped  the  vaulting- 
pole,  and  leaped.  The  one  drawback 
about  a  vaulting-pole  is  the  fact  that 
an  uneven  river-bed  affords  some 
times  a  treacherous  pivot  for  its 
curve.  Just  as  Geoffrey  reached  the 
perpendicular,  a  rock  caught  the  pole 
and  held  it  firmly  upright;  and  there 
126 


CEGROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

hung  Geoffrey,  at  half-mast.  He 
could  not  swing  the  pole  in  any  di 
rection.  It  was  wedged  too  firmly  in 
the  rocks.  The  pole  was  slippery 
from  long  experience  in  many  ponds, 
and  the  falling  action  was  swift. 
Down  slid  Geoffrey  into  the  middle 
of  the  water.  His  newts  and  his  cap 
swam  happily  down-stream  together, 
while  he,  brandishing  dip-net  and 
pail,  waded  ashore,  marched  his 
turtles  safely  at  last  to  Duck's  Pond, 
and  bade  them  good-bye  for  a  hun 
dred  years. 

At  supper-time,  a  little  tramp, 
muddy  and  soaking  from  head  to 
foot,  made  his  way  homeward.  His 
cap  was  gone.  His  hair  was  plastered 
down  in  an  amateur  attempt  at  a 
stylish  parting  in  the  middle.  On  his 
127 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

nose  and  across  his  cheek  were  rough 
red  scratches  where  his  face  had  bled 
and  dried.  In  his  hands  he  carried  his 
dip-net  and  a  large  tin  pail  of  newts. 
I  saw  him  coming,  and  went  to  meet 
him  at  the  front  door. 

"I  am  afraid,"  said  Geoffrey  apolo 
getically,  "that  I  have  spoiled  my 
looks  for  Easter." 

I  had  to  admit  that  I  was  afraid  he 
had.  I  also  began  to  see  that  Geof 
frey's  education  in  natural  history 
was  to  be  distinctly  a  thing  outside 
my  province.  Blood-suckers  and  Dob- 
sons,  frogs'-eggs,  rats  with  the  help  of 
his  dog,  and  even  an  occasional  eel  — 
I  was  by  no  means  broken-hearted 
when  the  rage  for  electricity  struck  my 
son  and  he  turned  from  salamanders 
to  sal-ammoniac  and  wet  batteries. 
128 


CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

The  girls'  investigations  were  more 
along  my  own  line.  They  did  not 
always  share  each  other's  tastes,  but 
they  kept  well  within  the  range  of 
mine.  Barbara,  for  instance,  passed 
through  a  phase  of  interest  in  geol 
ogy,  and  went  about  for  some  time 
with  hammer  and  text-book  collect 
ing  specimens.  That  fad  was  short 
lived.  Margaret,  who  is  ordinarily  a 
respecter  of  other  people's  property, 
used  Barbara's  specimens  of  ferru 
ginous  quartz  one  night,  to  throw  at 
cats.  Barbara  took  this  bereavement 
philosophically,  not  even  troubling 
herself  to  collect  her  specimens  from 
the  vicinity  of  the  neighboring  fence. 

She  did,  however,  redouble  her 
efforts  to  discourage  Margaret's  craze 
for  mushrooms.  Threats  of  mushroom 

129 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

poisoning,  she  knew,  had  no  effect 
whatever.  Margaret  was  accustomed 
to  take  high  ground  on  that  subject 
and  to  explain  that  she  was  not 
afraid  of  death,  as  such.  In  the  face 
of  every  protest,  she  went  on  collect 
ing  inky-caps  and  field-mushrooms, 
frying  them  in  butter,  and  consuming 
them  on  toast  —  until  Barbara's  in 
sight  hit  upon  the  weak  place  in  her 
sister's  defenses. 

"If  you  knew  how  affected  you  seem 
when  you  do  it  —  "  observed  Barbara, 
and  sighed  hopelessly.  The  trick  was 
done.  No  more  shaggy-manes,  no 
more  puff-balls.  Margaret  was  per^ 
manently  cured. 

It  was  long  after  the  children  had 
put  away  their  flower-books  and 
bird-lists  and  had  fully  grown  up, 
130 


CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

that  Barbara  had  a  belated  attack 
of  collecting  butterflies.  She  was 
ashamed  to  spend  the  money  that 
would  be  necessary  to  buy  a  regu 
lation  butterfly-net,  and  therefore 
looked  about  for  material  to  make 
one.  In  a  dark  corner  of  the  tool- 
house  she  found  Geoffrey's  old-time 
turtle  net,  with  its  long  heavy  pole 
and  stout  iron  hoop  and  twine  net 
ting.  A  clumsy  thing  indeed,  but 
effective.  She  replaced  the  ragged 
dip-net  with  a  new  one  made  of 
mosquito-gauze,  and  went  out  to 
ensnare  her  specimens.  Geoffrey  and 
Margaret  could  not  contain  their 
scorn.  Barbara  had  made  her  net 
very  long  and  slender,  because  her 
supply  of  mosquito-netting  was  not 
quite  wide  enough  in  proportion  to 

131 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

its  length.  The  consequent  shape  of 
the  net  reminded  Geoffrey  of  the 
Christmas-tree  stockings  made  of 
similar  material  and  filled  with  candy 
at  kindergarten  celebrations.  He  stole 
the  net,  and  with  Margaret's  help 
filled  it  with  an  appropriate  selection 
of  gifts:  an  orange  in  the  toe,  a  lit 
tle  old  square  copy  of  Paradise  Lost, 
a  Kewpie,  a  fish-horn,  a  wide  pink 
hair-ribbon,  and  a  pencil-box.  He 
added  an  affectionate  inscription,  and 
hung  the  offering,  landing-pole  and 
all,  at  Barbara's  place  at  table.  The 
recipient  was  unmoved.  She  said  that 
they  had  better  be  careful  not  to 
stretch  her  net.  She  assured  them  that 
a  new  one  would  cost  them  fifteen 
dollars. 
And  so  the  family  training  in 

132 


CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

nature-study  closed  as  it  began,  with 
butterflies  and  moths.  Every  spring 
now  when  I  sort  the  contents  of  the 
attic,  I  look  at  the  old  herbarium  and 
bird-records  and  the  butterfly  collec 
tion,  and  wonder  how  long  I  ought  to 
keep  them.  The  children  have  not 
gone  on  to  be  botanists  or  entomolo 
gists,  and  I  suppose  that  pretty  soon 
I  shall  throw  away  the  relics  of  their 
early  enthusiasms.  It  is  just  as  well. 
It  is  mainly  for  memories  that  we 
prize  our  old  pursuits.  It  is  worth  our 
while  simply  to  have  learned  some  of 
the  lovely  names  that  our  race  has 
found  for  the  little  things  of  the 
woods  and  sky.  Margaret  may  have 
been  routed  from  her  mushrooms,  but 
at  least  the  whole  family  had  heard 
several  times  the  names  of  the  Fairy 
133 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

Ring,  the  Little  Gray  Nuns,  and  the 
Angel  of  Death.  Barbara's  geological 
specimens  went  flying  out  into  the 
night,  but  we  shall  not  forget  her 
rose-quartz  nor  her  specimens  of 
shale  and  pudding-stone.  Things  in 
the  fields  and  swamps  have  now  the 
power  of  awakening  instant  associa 
tions  with  us  all.  The  reddening  of 
the  swamp-maple,  the  song  of  the 
meadow-lark,  the  pink  flutter  of  are- 
thusa  in  the  marshes,  the  cool  wet 
ness  of  pond-lily  stems,  —  every  one 
knows  how  these  can  stir  the  spirit. 
I  wish  that  there  were  time  to  know 
such  things  completely.  But  even  the 
slightest  knowledge  of  them  enriches 
the  family  tradition. 

Some  time  ago  an  old  friend  of 
Endicott's  was  visiting  us.  He  has 
134 


CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

lived  an  absorbing  life  in  his  profes 
sion,  but  he  has  also  kept  up  his 
interest  in  a  youthful  hobby  for  col 
lecting  rare  stones  and  fossil-remains. 
He  had  heard  that  there  was  a  rich 
hunting-ground  for  such  things  in  a 
region  near  our  town.  One  afternoon 
when  Endicott  was  busy  I  took  our 
guest  for  a  ride  and  we  made  an 
exploration  of  the  recommended  field. 
At  the  foot  of  the  ledges  were  the  very 
things  we  came  for,  and  we  sat  down 
on  the  stone  wall  to  examine  the 
discovery  and  to  exult.  I  glanced  at 
the  face  of  the  old  gentleman  beside 
me.  It  was  aglow  with  the  flush  of 
triumph  and  delight.  He  had  thrown 
his  hat  on  the  ground,  and  the  keen 
wind  of  late  autumn  stirred  his  white 
hair.  He  was  explaining  the  perfect 
135 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

points  of  the  specimens  with  all  the, 
eagerness  of  an  intent  mind.  As  we 
started  back  to  the  carriage,  my 
glance  strayed  just  beyond  the  drifts 
of  red  leaves  on  the  ground  beside 
the  wall.  There  was  a  patch  of  blue  in 
the  corner  by  the  bars.  Fringed  gen 
tians.  Dozens  of  them.  With  our  frag 
ment  of  rock  and  a  spray  of  fringed 
gentians  we  rode  home,  still  exchang 
ing  congratulations.  Our  afternoon 
had  been  a  success. 

I  think  that  there  was  something 
quite  genuine  in  our  cordial  response 
to  each  other's  enthusiasm  that  after 
noon.  Any  interest  which  retains 
permanently  the  power  to  charm  and 
freshen  the  imagination  brings  us 
moments  of  keen  excitement  which 
add  to  the  normal  quota  of  our  sym- 
136 


CECROPIA  MOTH  AND  OTHER  STUDIES 

pathies  and  our  experience.  The  zest, 
the  fresh  delight,  and  the  eagerness 
are  never  trivial,  whether  the  object 
that  arouses  them  is  a  fossil,  a  turtle, 
or  a  Cecropia  Moth. 


X 

ENDICOTT  AND  I  ECONOMIZE 

HEN  I  see  Endicott  com 
ing  up  the  steps  with  an 
Edam  cheese  under  one 
arm  and  a  large  bottle  of 


olives  under  the  other,  I  know  that 
I  have  carried  food-conservation  far 
enough.  In  theory,  our  family  is  heart 
ily  in  favor  of  plain  living  and  high 
thinking,  yet  there  are  many  admira 
ble  and  inexpensive  foods  that  they 
will  not  touch.  A  practical  maiden 
aunt  of  mine  suggests  that  I  might 
starve  them  into  it.  Unfortunately  my 
husband  and  son  and  daughters  are 
people  of  independent  resources,  and 
if  the  diet  that  I  provide  does  not 
138 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

minister  to  delight  as  well  as  to  diges 
tion,  all  sorts  of  little  donation  parties 
ensue  at  once.  My  relatives  begin  to 
bring  home  things  that  they  "saw  in 
a  window  down-street."  Endicott's 
favorite  reaction  seems  to  be  olives 
and  Edam  cheese,  but  he  has  been 
known  to  vary  that  choice  with  hot 
house  tomatoes,  or  squabs,  or  a 
lobster  of  great  price. 

This  complicates  my  plans.  Not 
only  in  war-time  but  on  general 
principles  I  am  a  thrifty  soul.  I  know 
how  to  make  left-overs  into  the  most 
delicious  ragouts  and  puddings  in  the 
world.  But  my  family  has  an  instinct 
for  appraising  food-values  on  a  cash 
basis.  The  instinct  is  unconscious,  for 
they  all  approve  of  thrift,  but  their 
appetites  register  none  the  less  ac- 
139 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

curately  the  difference  between  the 
costly  and  the  humble  dish. 

"Why  do  you  fuss  with  this  Illus 
trated  Cookery?"  inquires  Geoffrey 
when  he  finds  on  the  table  some  left 
over  disguised  as  delicacy  that  re 
minds  him  of  the  pictured  pages  of 
my  housekeeping  magazines.  "We'd 
just  exactly  as  soon  have  plain  things." 

Endicott  too  prides  himself  upon 
being  a  man  of  simple  tastes.  What 
could  be  more  unpretentious  than  a 
plain  cut  of  Porterhouse  steak,  simply 
broiled?  He  really  prefers  this  to  the 
most  elaborate  "made  dish."  When  it 
comes  to  oysters,  he  urges  me  not  to 
give  myself  the  trouble  of  concocting 
anything  as  elaborate  as  a  stew.  He  is 
perfectly  satisfied  with  Bluepoints  in 
their  shells  comfortably  roasted  over 
140 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

the  coals  in  the  fireplace,  quite  in 
a  plain,  old-fashioned  way.  In  fact, 
Endicott  expects  that  something  plain 
and  old-fashioned  is  going  to  be  pro 
vided  for  him  whenever  the  rest  of  us 
have  illustrated  cookery  for  dinner. 

Once  I  was  sure  that  I  had  struck 
a  combination  of  cannelon  of  beef  and 
tomato  sauce  that  every  one  would 
like.  Endicott  carefully  served  us  all, 
and  then,  with  his  carving-knife  and 
fork  at  parade  rest,  he  inquired,  "And 
what  is  Papa  going  to  eat?"  I  ex 
plained  that  the  elaborate  dish  before 
him  was  a  very  inexpensive  prepara 
tion  of  round  steak;  and  he  partook 
of  it  tolerantly  with  the  air  of  a  man 
who  must  uphold  national  issues. 
But  later  he  telephoned  to  say  that 
there  was  a  man  to  see  him  on  busi- 

141 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

ness  and  he  would  n't  come  up  to 
supper.  He  would  get  a  bite  down- 
street.  The  only  bite  that  Endicott 
sees  fit  to  get  down-street  costs  a 
dollar  a  plate.  When  he  begins  to  talk 
to  the  children  about  the  pleasures  of 
"gathering  around  the  frugal  board," 
I  know  that  it  is  about  time  for  him 
to  be  gathering  about  a  board  that  is 
not  quite  so  frugal,  and  I  hastily  stop 
retrenching. 

To  tell  the  truth,  when  I  try  to 
reduce  our  table  expenses  I  have  a 
sensation  of  stalking  my  family.  This 
is  nervous  work,  and  I  have  often 
suggested  that  we  might  do  better  to 
economize  in  some  direction  where 
the  rest  of  the  household  could  take 
more  responsibility. 

Endicott  and  Geoffrey  are  per- 
142 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

fectly  reasonable  about  this.  They 
decided  to  dispense  with  the  furnace- 
man  altogether  one  winter  and  at 
tend  to  the  heater  themselves.  As  part 
of  the  fitting  preparation,  Endicott 
bought  a  great  sprinkling-can  with 
which  to  water  the  ashes  to  keep 
them  from  flying  when  he  emptied 
them.  He  bought  a  large  pair  of 
gloves  with  gauntlets  for  his  cuffs, 
and  established  a  nail  for  them  over 
the  boiler.  He  also  bought  a  new  low 
chair  to  sit  in,  so  as  to  get  the  proper 
leverage  upon  the  ash-pan.  Then  fol 
lowed  a  remodeling  of  the  top  of  the 
chimney  to  improve  the  draught;  a 
new  scientific  form  of  shaker;  and 
daily  disparaging  utterances  about 
our  heating-plant. 

Geoffrey  and  his  father  agreed  per- 
143 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

fectly  about  the  heater.  They  named 
it  Flossie,  and  arranged  various 
patented  devices  with  alarm-clocks 
attached,  which  were  intended  to 
regulate  Flossie's  early  morning  ac 
tivities.  They  would  have  been  will 
ing,  I  think,  to  let  her  run  entirely 
by  alarm-clocks,  but  they  have  failed 
as  yet  to  find  one  that  will  shovel  on 
the  coal.  They  had  to  content  them 
selves  with  reducing  the  coal  to  a 
system.  Twice  a  day,  they  said,  was 
enough  to  feed  her,  and  I  was  im 
plored  not  to  intervene. 

Now  an  old  family  furnace  does 
not  take  kindly  to  systems,  and  Flos 
sie  has  always  had  her  little  ways.  I 
got  into  the  habit  of  going  surrepti 
tiously  to  the  cellar  myself  now  and 
then,  to  shake  her  down  and  coddle 

144 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

her  a  bit.  I  was  not  allowed  to  do 
this  when  my  family  was  in  the 
house.  They  drew  the  line  at  my 
shoveling  coal.  I  love  to  stoke,  and 
it  goes  against  all  my  finer  instincts 
to  stir  up  contented  men  from  their 
newspapers  and  send  them  down  to 
dark  cellars  where  they  hate  to  go. 
But  let  me  rattle  the  subterranean 
coal-shovel  never  so  softly,  and  I 
have  both  Endicott  and  Geoffrey 
roaring  at  my  heels.  They  consider  it 
a  reflection  on  them  when  I  do  it. 
With  infinite  patience  they  divest  me 
of  my  shovel,  and  explain  over  and 
over  again  their  famous  system.  All 
winter  they  ran  the  heater,  and  all 
winter  I  carried  on  my  clandestine 
activities  in  the  cellar.  As  time  went 
on,  Flossie  and  I  began  rather  to  miss 

145 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

the  furnace-man,  but  we  tried  to  con 
sole  ourselves  with  the  thought  of 
the  elegant  new  equipment  we  had 
acquired. 

In  the  spring,  it  seemed,  Endicott 
was  planning  to  continue  his  role  of 
Handy  Man  About  the  House.  Late 
one  busy  afternoon,  I  found  him  pre 
paring  to  put  on  the  screens.  He 
usually  sends  up  his  office-janitor  to 
do  this,  but  your  true  thrifter  does 
not  pay  janitors  to  do  things  that 
can  be  done  as  well  by  home  talent. 
It  is  no  child's  play  to  put  on  our 
screens,  but  Endicott  went  about  it 
with  a  high  heart. 

Probably  every  house  in  the  world 

except   ours    has    uniform    windows 

and  uniform  screens,  so  that  all  the 

screens  fit  all  the  windows,  no  mat- 

146 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

ter  how  you  pair  them  off.  Ours  are 
not  like  that.  No  two  of  our  windows 
are  equiangular  nor  equilateral,  and 
our  screens  are  made  in  assorted 
shapes  and  sizes  according  to  the 
windows  that  they  respectively  fit. 
Consequently,  they  fit  no  way  except 
respectively.  We  have  bent  squares 
and  rhomboids,  trapezoids  and  trape 
zia;  and  woe  to  the  man  that  tries 
to  put  an  oblong  screen  into  a  bent 
hole.  I  have  marked  the  screens  and 
the  window-ledges  with  a  neat  code 
of  my  own,  so  that  I  know  at  a  glance 
where  each  should  go,  and  by  dint 
of  annual  supervision  I  have  taught 
my  code  to  Endicott's  janitor.  But  it 
had  never  occurred  to  me  to  instruct 
Endicott.  He  is  not  commonly  given 
to  furbishing  up  the  premises. 

147 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

He  went  about  busily,  however, 
trying  a  screen  here  and  a  screen 
there,  rattling  them,  reversing  them, 
turning  them  upside  down,  and  fin 
ally  fastening  each  securely  into  the 
window  which  it  seemed  most  ap 
proximately  to  fit.  My  advice  was 
not  asked,  nor  offered.  When  Endi- 
cott  takes  to  sloyd  work  I  have 
learned  to  subside.  I  have  no  doubt 
that  connubial  murders  have  been 
committed  with  a  screw-driver.  I 
was  therefore  prudently  absorbed  in 
various  neutral  occupations  in  the 
sewing-room  when  Endicott  appeared 
at  the  window  with  a  screen  in  one 
hand  and  a  roll  of  screen-cloth  in  the 
other. 

"I  have  tried  this  screen  in  all  the 
windows,"  said  Endicott,  looking  at 
148 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

it  with  some  distaste,  "and  it  does  n't 
fit  anything,  any  side  up  or  either  side 
out.  That  makes  me  short  one  screen. 
The  rest  are  all  on.  Do  you  mind  if  I 
use  screen-cloth  for  this  window?" 

I  expressed  approval,  and  minded 
my  own  business  more  feverishly  than 
ever  while  he  unrolled  his  square  of 
screen-cloth  and  produced  his  box  of 
tacks. 

"Would  you  mind  shutting  the 
window?"  asked  Endicott  regretfully, 
after  some  moments  of  measuring  and 
pounding.  "I  shall  have  to  nail  the 
bottom  of  this  screen-cloth  to  the 
lower  part  of  the  window-sash  itself. 
It  turns  out  to  be  a  little  scant." 

"But  if  you  nail  it  to  the  sash,"  I 
ventured,  "how  can  we  open  the 
window?" 

149 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

Endicott  considered,  resourcefully. 

"We  don't  really  have  to  open  this 
window,  do  we?"  he  inquired.  "We 
could  use  the  other  always  and  keep 
this  one  shut." 

"Then,"  said  I,  as  mildly  as  pos 
sible,  "if  we  are  n't  going  to  open  the 
window  why  do  we  need  a  screen  at 
all?" 

When  a  beautiful  truth  dawns  upon 
Endicott,  he  acts  on  it  at  once.  He 
genially  pried  out  his  tacks,  rolled  up 
his  screen-cloth,  and  telephoned  to 
his  janitor  to  come  up  and  measure 
us  for  a  new  screen.  Proper  screening, 
Endicott  remarked  as  he  and  the 
janitor  installed  the  new  one,  is  the 
truest  economy. 

About  the  pear-tree  I  was  not 
such  a  model  of  wifely  tact.  There 
150 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

was  a  drooping  limb  on  one  of  our 
trees  overhanging  the  sidewalk  in 
front  of  our  house.  This  lowest  branch 
had  a  habit  of  involving  itself  with 
people's  umbrellas  on  rainy  days.  It 
caught  the  top  of  the  umbrella  and 
jerked  it  back  against  the  passing 
hat,  spattering  down  showers  of  rain 
water  on  the  upturned  face  in  the 
most  exasperating  way.  It  is  annoy 
ing  to  stub  your  toe,  but  it  is  far  more 
annoying  to  stub  your  unbrella.  For 
some  time  we  had  been  going  to  have 
that  branch  removed,  and  now  Endi- 
cott  decided  that  he  himself  would  do 
it  in  a  trice. 

I  came  home  one  afternoon  to  find 

the  thing  accomplished.  That  bough 

would  never  again  ensnare  umbrellas, 

but  the  operation  had  been  oddly  per 

151 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

formed.  Endicott  had  cut  off  the 
branch  at  a  narrow  place  just  before 
the  twigs  and  leaves  began,  and  had 
left  an  awkward  eighteen-inch  length 
of  the  pear-tree  limb  which  thrust 
itself  out  at  right  angles  with  the 
trunk,  like  a  semaphore.  The  relieved 
passersby  could  afford  to  be  jocose. 
They  said  that  it  looked  like  the 
spout  of  a  tea-pot.  Workmen  oiling 
the  road  hung  their  coats  and  dinner- 
pails  upon  it.  A  hook  so  conveniently 
placed  is  surely  not  meant  to  be 
ignored  by  an  appreciative  public. 
Endicott  insisted  that  people  would 
soon  get  used  to  it,  but  I  knew  that  I 
never  could.  I  called  up  my  favorite 
workman  and  engaged  him  to  saw  off 
our  famous  land-mark  nearer  to  the 
trunk.  There  are  times  when  the 

152 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

simple  laboring  man  has  a  warm  place 
in  my  regard. 

After  a  good  deal  of  this  kind  of 
thing  had  gone  on,  Endicott  and  I 
were  discussing  our  results.  We  saw 
that  when  we  economized  on  service 
we  usually  laid  out  more  on  new  tools 
and  experiments  than  we  saved  by 
doing  the  work.  The  example  might 
be  good  for  others  and  the  spirit 
noble,  but  the  difference  in  our  cash- 
account  was  negligible.  I  suggested 
that  we  might  look  over  the  budget 
once  more  to  see  what  personal  ex 
penditures  might  be  cut  down  en 
tirely. 

"If  Mother 's  going  to  cut  anything, 

it  ought  to  be  agents,"  said  Barbara 

with  feeling.  "She  doesn't  know  how 

to  cut  'em.  They  come  around  sell- 

153 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

ing  brushes  to  go  through  college. 
She  says  that  they  are  just  about 
Geoffrey's  age."  Barbara  glanced  at 
Geoffrey  with  a  sardonic  and  sisterly 
eye.  "She  bought  some  more  brushes 
just  yesterday." 

"It  wasn't  exactly  a  brush,"  I  pro 
tested.  "It  was  a  very  good  little 
knife-sharpener  that  you  turn  with  a 
crank." 

"Yes,"  continued  Barbara  unfeel 
ingly;  "and  last  week  there  was  a 
handy  can-opener  that  would  n't  open 
anything  after  the  man  had  gone. 
But  mostly  it's  brushes.  Radiator 
brushes,  stove  brushes,  gas-pipe 
brushes.  All  kinds." 

Barbara  seated  herself  at  the  piano 
and  began  to  play,  partly  to  cover  my 
embarrassment,  and  partly  to  ob- 
154 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

scure  any  argument  that  I  might 
have  made.  But  I  am  perfectly  willing 
to  admit  a  weakness  when  I  have  one. 
I  know  that  I  ought  not  to  let  my 
impulses  as  a  hostess  and  a  parent 
run  away  with  my  funds.  But  it  is 
true  that  an  enterprising  young  agent 
finds  me  tame  quarry.  When  I  can, 
I  try  to  leave  such  parleys  to  Barbara. 
It  is  she,  if  any  one,  who  finds  out 
about  Endicott's  extravagances  in 
new  books.  That  is  the  thing  that 
Endicott  cannot  help  buying.  He  sees 
them  advertised  in  irresistible  book- 
reviews  and  dealers'  notices.  He 
glimpses  their  tantalizing  pages  lying 
open  in  the  windows  of  the  pub 
lishers.  Every  so  often  he  casts  aside 
all  restraint,  goes  into  a  brain-storm, 
and  buys  books  of  all  kinds.  He 
155 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

gathers  them  in  by  the  armful,  in 
sets,  in  five-foot  shelves.  His  method 
after  one  of  these  rash  purchasing- 
bees  is  to  keep  the  new  books  quietly 
at  the  office,  just  as  new  wine  is  set 
away  for  a  time,  to  age.  When  the 
bindings  have  grown  sufficiently  old 
and  useful-looking,  he  brings  up  the 
volumes  one  at  a  time  quite  casually 
to  the  house.  If  any  one  asks  ques 
tions  he  replies  easily,  "That?  That's 
a  book  that  I  bought  once  in  Bos 
ton.  As  I  remember  it,  it  was  pretty 
good."  An  old-time  purchase  like 
that  never  sounds  extravagant.  A 
book  that  has  become  blended  with 
its  owner's  past  does  not  seem  exactly 
like  a  purchase  at  all.  It  is  a  part  of 
one's  growth,  and  dollars  and  cents 
have  nothing  to  do  with  it. 
156 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

If  I  could  only  conceal  my  brushes 
and  can-openers  until  they  too  could 
grow  old  and  weather-beaten  with 
hard  use!  But  Barbara  knows  all  the 
places  where  I  keep  brushes. 

Sometimes  when  the  children  are 
away,  Endicott  and  I  confer  with  real 
seriousness  upon  this  question  of 
thrift.  We  reluctantly  admit  that  the 
amassing  of  funds  is  not  our  strong 
point.  We  can  economize  on  some 
things,  but  not  on  others.  I  know 
that  I  shall  save  something  on  to-mor 
row's  frugal  board;  but  I  also  know 
that  I  shall  spend  it  presently  on 
violin  strings  and  camera  plates.  It 
seems  to  go  that  way.  We  make  reso 
lutions,  and  manage  ingeniously,  and 
we  save.  Then  we  have  impulses  and 
appeals  and  accidents,  and  we  spend. 
157 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

The  more  complex  the  family  inter 
ests,  the  harder  it  is  to  balance  the 
savings  and  the  extravagances.  We 
have  never,  for  instance,  had  any 
kind  of  phonograph.  The  money 
saved  from  this,  we  felt  we  could 
devote  with  a  clear  conscience  to  the 
musical  training  of  the  children.  Not 
an  elaborate  training,  but  courses  of 
lessons  on  different  instruments,  just 
enough  so  that  we  might  form  a 
family  orchestra.  We  have  the  or 
chestra,  but  we  have  not  noticed 
that  the  money  saved  on  phonograph 
records  has  made  us  very  rich.  We 
also  hardened  our  hearts  against  auto 
mobiles  and  motor-boats  and  the 
delights  of  travel.  It  would  not  hurt 
the  children  to  do  without  non- 
essential  matters.  Just  a  college  course 
158 


WE  ECONOMIZE 

for  each  of  them  and  a  bit  of  voca 
tional  training  before  they  went  — 
we  believed  in  bringing  up  the  family 
very  simply.  Yet  for  all  its  simplicity, 
we  have  not  found  it  a  money-saving 
device. 

"Of  course,"  says  Endicott,  after  a 
few  moments  of  this  earnest  talk,  "I 
wouldn't  give  up  some  of  the  things 
that  we  have  enjoyed  for  a  good 
many  stocks  and  bonds.  We  might 
have  managed  those  too  if  we  had 
been  gifted  that  way,  but  as  it  is  we 
have  the  things  we  wanted  most. 
Still  —  we  must  see  that  the  children 
do  not  repeat  our  mistakes." 

Endicott  pauses  reflectively. 

"In  fact  it's  high  time  now,"  says 
Endicott,  "that  we  began  to  save." 


XI 

DAR'ST  THOU,  CASSIUS? 

HERE  are  people  who 
cannot  whistle;  people 
who  cannot  distinguish 
red  from  green;  people 
who  cannot  carry  a  tune.  These  limi 
tations  we  accept  as  facts,  recognizing 
reasonable  demonstration.  But  about 
certain  other  limitations,  men  are 
incurably  sanguine.  I,  for  instance, 
cannot  learn  to  swim.  For  years  I 
have  been  called  upon  to  demonstrate 
this  incapacity  to  a  curious  and  skep 
tical  seaside  public.  But  no  matter 
how  thorough  my  demonstrations, 
people  will  not  grasp  the  fact  that  I 
constitutionally  cannot  swim.  They 

160 


DAR'ST  THOU,  CASSIUS? 

assume  that  I  am  learning.  The  in 
competent  person  trying  to  swim  is 
never  regarded  as  a  defective:  he  is 
regarded  as  a  beginner.  The  optimistic 
salt-water  mind  is  incapable  of  ab 
sorbing  tragedy.  It  cannot  accept  the 
fact  that  a  being  may  appear  once  or 
twice  in  history  who  is  unable  to 
begin.  I  cannot  begin  to  swim,  and 
the  person  whom  I  have  tried  the 
hardest  to  convince  of  this  final  fact 
is  my  son  Geoffrey,  a  youth  of  heavy 
hand  and  towering  ambitions,  whose 
will  to  power  is  weakened  by  no  base 
alloy  of  pity. 

He  suddenly  decided  one  summer 
that  it  was  a  family  oversight  not  to 
have  brought  me  to  the  swimming 
point.  I  must  learn  at  once. 

I  should  explain  without  further 

161 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

delay  that  I  am  in  my  element  in  the 
salt  water,  if  left  to  myself.  I  am  not 
like  Endicott,  who  snatches  the  hour 
of  rare  calm  at  the  cottage  for  his 
newspaper  and  the  hammock.  Nor 
am  I  like  Margaret,  who  spends  the 
bathing-hour  sitting  high  upon  the 
beach,  fully  clad  in  muslin,  acting  as 
curator  of  wrist-watches,  bath-house 
keys,  and  children's  water-wings.  My 
natural  method  in  the  salt  water  is 
to  rest  my  finger-tips  on  the  white 
sand  of  the  ocean-bed,  where  the 
water  is  not  quite  two  cubits  deep, 
and  thus  to  lie  at  ease  in  the  rocking 
brine,  drifting  gently  inshore  with 
the  waves.  The  sun  makes  wavering 
lights  in  the  shallow  water;  the  peb 
bly  sand  runs  in  and  out  through  my 
fingers;  and  if  a  more  generous  billow 
162 


DAR'ST  THOU,  GASSIUS  ? 

than  usual  washes  me  too  far  inland, 
I  can  back  lazily  out  on  my  finger 
tips  again  until  I  reach  the  ideal 
depth  once  more,  where  the  shelving 
sand  is  exactly  at  arm's  length  from 
the  surface.  Anchored  in  this  way,  I 
am  not  emulous  of  my  sea-going 
friends;  I  am  too  contented. 

The  exacting  Geoffrey,  however, 
cannot  countenance  my  methods.  He 
trusts  that  I  will  admit  the  fact  that 
I  cannot  learn  to  swim  in  two  feet  of 
water.  He  gives  me  fair  warning 
early  in  the  day  that  he  will  teach  me 
to  swim  at  eleven.  At  half-past  ten 
he  leads  me  to  the  door  of  the  bath 
house  and  bids  me  make  ready. 

When  I  know  that  a  swimming- 
lesson  is  in  store,  my  outlook  upon 
the  ocean  undergoes  a  chilling  change. 
163 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

A  typical  morning  of  water-sport  goes 
somewhat  like  this:  Tricked  out  in 
black  suit  and  gay  cap,  I  cower  be 
hind  the  bath-house  door,  dreading 
my  debut.  Through  the  crescent- 
shaped  window  that  looks  out  upon 
the  sand  I  can  see  my  daughter  Bar 
bara  swinging  down  through  the 
beach-grass  with  a  thoughtless  confi 
dence  that  is  now  my  envy. With  one 
tragic  eye  glued  to  the  crescent  moon, 
I  watch  her  as  she  dives  lightly  from 
the  pier,  and  I  listen  as  Geoffrey 
roars  to  her  to  race  him  to  the  raft. 
I  wait  until  all  the  family  and  all  the 
friends  of  the  family  are  well  under 
water.  At  last,  when  further  delay 
would  mean  a  search  party,  I  emerge 
from  my  sandy  cell.  I  start  off  down 
the  board  walk,  trying  to  advance  to 

164 


DAR'ST  THOU,  CASSIUS? 

my  fate  with  assurance,  watching  a 
distant  sail.  But  I  cannot  help  quail 
ing  at  that  which  is  to  come. 

I  think  that  I  could  endure  it  all 
better  if  I  could  for  once  go  into  the 
deep  water  unattended.  But  no.  The 
crowd  hails  me  with  cordial  cries. 
A  dutiful  son  comes  striding  out 
through  the  surf  to  meet  me,  dripping 
arms  outstretched.  The  touch  of  a 
water-soaked  sea-monster  is  a  horror 
to  the  flesh.  I  evade  the  clammy  arms 
hysterically,  and  throw  myself  des 
perately  into  the  sea.  Then,  standing 
rigidly  up  to  my  neck  in  freezing 
brine,  I  turn  one  fearful  eye  upon  my 
approaching  tutor.  With  such  a 
glance,  a  mink  in  a  trap  observes  the 
approaching  canoe  of  the  hunter;  you 
may  see  the  same  bright  look  of 
165 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

questioning  terror  in  the  eyes  of  a 
wild  kitten  cornered  in  a  loft. 

Geoffrey  is  not  sensitive  to  dra 
matic  atmosphere.  Purposefully  he 
approaches,  threshing  the  surface  as 
he  comes. 

I  shall  not  attempt  to  describe  all 
that  happens  next.  I  cannot  answer 
for  the  subtleties  of  teaching  a  non- 
teachable,  non-aquatic  animal  to 
swim.  But  to  any  incredulous  critic 
who  suggests  that  I  have  not  been 
trained  by  the  proper  method,  I  reply: 
I  have  been  trained  by  all  the  methods. 
There  is  no  device  given  under  heaven 
among  men  that  has  not  been  tried 
upon  me.  Consultations  have  been 
held  over  me.  Experts  have  been 
called  in  from  distant  parts  to  look  me 
over.  Possibly  not  all  the  devices 

166 


DAR'ST  THOU,  CASSIUS  ? 

were  tried  quite  long  enough,  but 
that  was  not  the  fault  of  my  tutor. 
My  case  is  still  to  him  a  tantalizing 
problem,  complex  in  technicalities, 
and  because  insoluble  fascinating.  I 
can  see  him  now  in  my  uneasy  dreams 
as  he  pauses  for  a  moment,  balanc 
ing  me  on  one  careful  hand,  while  he 
reflects  upon  the  details  of  his  next 
experiment. 

I  try  to  help  him  all  I  can.  I  fol 
low  orders  with  touching  intelligence, 
writhing  along  upon  the  water  in  all 
the  prescribed  angles.  But  one  thing 
I  cannot  control.  I  cannot  help  sink 
ing.  Out  of  my  great  love  for  my 
trainer  I  have  learned  to  sink  without 
struggling.  I  can  go  down  with  per 
fect  repose  of  manner,  like  a  sinking 
star. 

167 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

Geoffrey  will  never  understand  this. 
"Have  a  little  confidence,"  he  im 
plores,  "and  you  can't  sink." 

Obediently  I  have  confidence.  My 
soul  rises  to  confidence,  as  an  oriental 
worshiper  lifts  his  heart  in  spiritual 
sublimity  before  his  hopeless  gods. 
Yet  with  all  my  confidence  thick 
upon  me,  I  sink;  sink  with  the  mod 
eration  and  firmness  of  a  subma 
rine  submerging  with  all  on  board. 
I  sink  unanimously;  not  head-first, 
not  feet-first,  but  horizontally  and  as 
a  whole. 

It  seems  that  I  am  not  to  be  per 
mitted  to  drown.  Just  as  I  am  begin 
ning  to  grow  resigned  to  the  calmness 
of  the  lower  deeps,  I  am  fished  up 
again,  and  arranged  carefully  once 
more  upon  the  waves,  like  a  needle 

168 


DAR'STTHOU,  CASSIUS? 

on  the  surface  of  a  glass  of  water,  and 
bidden  yet  another  time  to  "Strike 
out." 

Strike  out!  Oh,  attitudes  most  or 
thodox  and  frog-like!  I  have  learned 
to  strike  them  all.  Not,  however, upon 
the  surface.  The  great  combers  close 
over  me,  and  I  go  down;  then  rhyth 
mically  I  am  drawn  back  to  the  sur 
face  again  by  loving  hands,  my  dizzy 
brain  repeating  faintly  a  lovely  line 
of  poetry  with  new  meaning: 

"  From  the  great  deep  to  the  great  deep  she 
goes." 

The  very  cadence  is  soothing. 

This  is  the  way  it  always  happens 
— not  one  time  nor  twenty  times,  nor 
ninety-nine  times  out  of  a  hundred, 
but  always.  It  always  will  happen 
this  way,  because  I  cannot  swim. 
169 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

Yet  Geoffrey  is  blind  to  proof.  He 
still  believes  that  it  is  some  omission 
of  his  that  keeps  me  helpless.  No 
doubt  when  he  comes  back  from 
across  the  water,  he  will  want  to  trj 
new  methods,  learned  perhaps  from 
Turks. 

At  all  events,  no  swimming-hour 
goes  by  without  a  new  variation 
of  technique,  guaranteed  by  friends. 
At  times  I  question  the  value  of  a 
wide  circle  of  acquaintance,  technical 
and  ingenious.  Too  drugged  by  sea- 
water  by  this  time  to  suffer  much, 
however,  I  struggle  on,  only  mind 
enough  left  to  wonder  what  great 
faith  supports  this  excellent  son  of 
mine  that  he  should  spend  the  entire 
bathing-hour  alternately  launching 
me  and  dredging  for  me  with  the 
170 


DAR'ST  THOU,  CASSIUS? 

morose  persistence  of  a  secretary  of 
the  navy. 

Usually,  just  as  the  last  glimmer  of 
human  intelligence  is  about  to  be 
drowned  out,  my  respite  comes.  Bar 
bara,  surging  along  from  her  revels 
by  the  raft,  comes  paddling  by: 
"Make  her  go  in,"  she  advises  my 
master.  "She  ought  not  to  overdo 
when  she  is  just  learning.  Hi!  Hurry! 
Fish  her  up !  Now  make  her  go  in." 

Make  her  go  in!  With  an  ironic 
cackle  I  laugh  terribly  between  chat 
tering  teeth,  and  wade  out,  stiffly 
flapping. 

In  "The  Egoist,"  George  Meredith 
in  an  admiring  mood  describes  Clara 
Middleton's  graceful  way  of  walking 
from  the  garden  to  the  house  as 
"swimming"  across  the  grassy  lawn. 
171 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

Meredith  has  been  criticized  for  this 
figure  of  speech.  Many  readers  con 
demn  it  as  far-fetched  and  artificial. 
But  I  support  Meredith.  If  one  must 
swim,  the  best  place  for  it,  in  my 
opinion,  is  the  lawn. 


XII 
BARBARA  DEVELOPS  THE  LAND 

NDICOTT  and  I  have 
an  admiration  for  well- 
kept  grounds  and  orderly 
premises.  Therefore,  our 
consciences  used  to  trouble  us  as  we 
considered  the  looks  of  our  estate  when 
the  children  were  small.  We  ran,  in 
those  days,  an  amateur  playground  in 
our  back  yard ;  sand-piles  and  potato- 
bakes,  croquet  wickets  and  a  tennis 
set,  a  hop-scotch  field  and  a  house  for 
the  bandit  Geoffrey.  Our  back  yard 
was  small,  and  these  things  filled 
it  full.  These  furnishings,  moreover, 
were  not  all  of  the  strictly  ornamental 
type.  No  landscape  gardener  had 
173 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

been  consulted  as  to  their  placement, 
and  the  "values"  were  by  no  means 
according  to  his  art.  Geoffrey's  little 
house,  for  instance,  was  made  from 
a  large  piano  box,  clapboarded  and 
shingled,  the  interior  furnished  and 
inhabited  by  his  roistering  gang  of 
followers.  Where  we  should  have  had 
a  "velvet  lawn,"  the  boys  had  sunk 
old  tubs  in  the  ground  as  often  as  they 
felt  the  need  of  a  new  turtle-tank; 
and  up  and  down  within  these  ponds 
sailed  scores  of  stately  turtles  with 
inquiring  necks  thrust  forth.  There 
was  no  room  to  keep  a  garden.  Relics 
of  our  former  flower-beds  struggled 
here  and  there  —  a  flowering  almond 
bush  by  the  fence-corner,  a  vine-like 
growth  known  as  perennial  pea,  which 
miraculously  reappeared  every  spring, 

174 


BARBARA  DEVELOPS  THE  LAND 

striped  grass  beneath  the  plum-trees, 
and  a  row  of  grapevines  by  the  wall, 
these  last  immensely  encouraged  by 
the  boys.  This  was  about  all,  except 
the  apple  tree,  laden  with  Baldwins 
and  acrobats  each  fall.  In  fact,  our 
back  yard  was  not  one  of  the  sightly 
spots  of  town. 

Then  Geoffrey,  outgrowing  turtles 
and  his  little  house,  moved  upward 
to  his  attic  work-room.  The  gang, 
busy  there  with  print-shop  and  wire 
less,  climbed  the  garret  stairs  instead 
of  the  apple  tree,  and  left  the  yard 
deserted.  The  garden  rested  quietly 
in  the  sun. 

Here,  logically,  might  have  been 

our  chance  to  reassert  our  suspended 

plans  for  a  picturesque  and  fruitful 

plot  of  ground.  Endicott,   however, 

175 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

is  no  born  tiller  of  the  soil,  and  I  had 
other  rows  to  hoe. 

Barbara,  at  this  point,  announced 
that  she  was  going  to  have  a  garden. 
She  said  it  in  that  decided  tone  in  which 
Saint  Simeon  Stylites  told  his  friends 
that  he  was  going  to  have  a  pillar. 
This  tone,  from  Barbara,  means  per 
sistence  through  mockings  and  scourg- 
ings.  The  mockings  are  the  specialty 
of  her  brother  Geoffrey. 

"It's  too  bad,"  said  she,  "to  have 
that  ground  running  to  waste,  with 
nothing  growing  on  it  to  amount  to 
anything." 

"There's  the  Perennial  Pea,"  said 
Geoffrey  hopefully. 

"That,"  said  Barbara  firmly,  "is 
never  going  to  come  up  again." 

Barbara  is  business-like  and  inde- 
176 


BARBARA  DEVELOPS  THE  LAND 

pendent.  She  believes  in  consulting 
experts  before  she  makes  her  plans. 
That  afternoon  she  went  alone  to  her 
grandfather's,  hunted  up  his  work 
man  who  was  busy  about  the  early 
gardening,  and  consulted  him. 

"You  can't  expect  to  have  no  such 
garden  as  this,"  Andrews  told  her. 
"This  land  of  your  grandpa's  has  had 
something  put  on  it  for  years  and 
years.  You  can't  have  a  good  garden 
without  you  put  something  on  it." 

Barbara  decided  that  her  garden 
should  have  something  on  it,  and 
inquired  what. 

In  the  season  that  followed  we  saw 
her  transformed  before  our  eyes. 
From  a  cheerful  ornament  to  the 
household  and  a  talented  adjunct  to 
our  various  exploits,  she  became  pre- 
177 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

occupied,  her  conversation  smacking 
strongly  of  the  soil.  Instead  of  going 
up  to  call  on  her  grandmother,  she 
went  up  to  see  Andrews.  She  hob 
nobbed  sociably  with  the  butter-man, 
exchanging  with  him  anecdotes  about 
transplantings  and  cut-worms.  The 
word  "cut- worms,"  we  learned,  is 
the  pass-word  and  countersign  among 
gardeners.  Barbara  spent  confidential 
moments  at  the  door  with  a  certain 
kindly  and  dejected  Mr.  Pollard  who 
raises  vegetables  and  mingled  her 
tears  with  his  as  he  recounted  the 
depredations  of  the  cut-worms  — 
these  subterrenes. 

"Ten  rod  of  radishes,"  sighed  Mr. 
Pollard,  "and  all  but  two  rod  cut 
clean  off!" 

"When  do  they  turn  into  butter- 
178 


BARBARA  DEVELOPS  THE  LAND 

flies,"  asked  Barbara,  "and  stop  cut 
ting?" 

"They  don't  never  stop,"  said  Mr. 
Pollard  morosely.  "They  keep  right 
on  a-cuttin'." 

The  vegetable  garden,  however, 
was  not  Barbara's  most  intimate 
concern.  Her  most  thoughtful  plan 
ning  was  devoted  to  the  flowers. 
She  had  a  feeling  that  a  garden  as 
small  as  hers  should  not  be  too  flat. 
The  plants  should  hold  their  blossoms 
rather  high.  She  knew  the  flowers 
that  she  wanted,  most  of  them  hardy 
perennials,  blooming  the  second  year. 
That  first  spring  she  spent  her  time 
transplanting  frail  wisps  of  green, 
setting  out  the  seedlings  in  careful 
groups,  and  later  weeding  plump 
rosettes  of  flowerless  green  plants 
179 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

through  the  summer.  Snapdragons, 
digitalis,  hollyhocks,  and  delphinium 
—  all  these  were  only  one  sober  mass 
of  green. 

She  did  not  tell  us  her  trials.  We 
could  not  help  knowng  it  when  a  row 
of  hopeful  shoots  that  she  had  just 
transplanted  for  the  second  time 
burst  into  bloom,  producing  the  un 
mistakable  fine  flower  of  chickweed. 
Barbara  explained  that  in  the  coty 
ledon  stage  she  had  thought  that  it 
was  something  else,  more  rare  and 
generally  sought  after,  that  evidently 
had  never  come  up  at  all.  She  called 
our  attention  to  the  fact  that  it  was 
uncommonly  thrifty  chickweed. 

She  did  consult  the  family  about 
her  pink  sunflowers.  "They  bloom 
right  away,"  she  began,  "and  will 
180 


BARBARA  DEVELOPS  THE  LAND 

make  a  rapid  effect  this  first  year. 
They  are  of  dwarfish  growth,  and  the 
petals  are  creamy  white,  with  rose- 
color  around  the  edges.  You  can  cut 
them  and  they  blossom  all  the  more. 
'Gut  and  come  again,'  the  catalogue 
says." 

We  advised  pink  sunflowers,  by  all 
means.  How  they  grew!  "A  rapid 
effect"  was  a  conservative  phrase. 
They  grew  into  great  angular  stalks, 
with  rank  towers  of  rough  green 
leaves,  where  swarms  of  grasshoppers 
sprang  explosively  out  upon  the 
passer-by.  The  first  enormous  bud 
appeared,  fat  and  round  and  hard. 
We  watched  with  suspense  for  the 
pink  sunflower  to  unroll  its  rays  of 
rose  and  cream-color,  as  advertised. 
"La  tulipe  noire,"  Geoffrey  called  it. 

181 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

And  one  morning  when  we  looked  out 
it  was  open.  Its  perfidious  heart  lay 
flat  to  view,  and  every  sturdy  petal 
was  bright  yellow,  the  yellow  of  a 
healthy  pumpkin  on  a  sunny  day. 

"Just  exactly  like  the  sunflowers 
around  Mr.  Pollard's  chicken-yard," 
remarked  Barbara  cheerfully.  "Only 
larger." 

At  that  same  time,  the  hollyhocks 
were  weighing  heavily  on  their  own 
er's  mind.  Three  dozen  beautiful 
plants  out  by  the  fence  were  attacked 
by  hollyhock  rust,  and  were  curling 
up  their  leaves  to  die.  Barbara  went 
at  once  to  Geoffrey. 

"You  have  to  spray  my  hollyhocks 
with  whale-oil  soap,"  announced  Bar 
bara  politely. 

"Why?"  asked  Geoffrey.  The  most 
182 


BARBARA  DEVELOPS  THE  LAND 

casual  reference  to  whale-oil  soap 
makes  Geoffrey's  social  manner  a  bit 
stilted.  His  tone  now  was  chilly. 

"Because  I  can't  work  the  spray," 
explained  Barbara. 

"I  '11  show  you!"  Geoffrey  started 
hopefully  for  the  tool-house. 

"No."  Barbara  was  calm  but  reso 
lute.  "I'll  melt  the  whale-oil  so  — " 

"Look  here,"  began  Geoffrey  rea 
sonably.  "You  don't  know  what  it 
means  to  spray  the  under  side  of 
those  leaves.  You  have  to  go  at  it 
upside  down,  and  the  stuff  gets  all 
over  you.  Your  little  old  hollyhocks 
will  live  just  as  well  without  whale- 
oil  soap  as  with.  What  do  you  care?" 

But  Geoffrey  went  forth  with  the 
sprayer,  and  sprayed.  Whale-oil  soap, 
he  said,  went  a  long  way.  He  was 
183 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

confident  that  there  would  never  be 
any  hollyhock  rust  on  him. 

A  varied  life  for  Barbara  began 
with  that  year.  Now  that  the  garden 
is  a  family  institution,  it  seems  odd 
to  reflect  on  the  experimental  season 
when  the  roses  and  radishes  were  her 
chief  consolation.  For  the  garden  is 
a  pleasure  now.  The  flowers  are  tall 
and  graceful,  well  above  the  ground. 
Spires  of  giant  larkspur,  deep  blue 
and  light  blue  and  lavender,  rise  just 
beyond  the  pointed  stalks  of  white 
foxglove,  gleaming  against  the  shad 
ows.  Lofty  Japan  lilies  grow  along 
the  path,  and  hollyhocks  beside  the 
wall.  It  is  hard  to  suggest  in  words 
the  effect  of  those  straight,  thin  lines 
of  bloom  rising  all  over  the  garden. 
The  beauty  of  the  flowers  seems  to  be 
184 


BARBARA  DEVELOPS  THE  LAND 

starting  upward  in  slender  shafts  of 
color,  from  the  green  below.  It  is  best 
after  a  late  shower,  when  it  stands  in 
the  low  sunlight.  Against  the  cool 
wetness  of  the  leaves  lie  the  shadows 
of  the  flower-spires,  and  the  clear 
tones  of  blue  and  ivory  in  the  blos 
soms  content  the  eye. 

Endicott  and  I  stood  watching  it 
late  one  afternoon,  as  the  children 
went  out  to  tie  up  the  bent  stalks 
after  a  summer  storm.  It  was  a  pic 
ture  that  we  like  to  remember  —  the 
girls,  with  Geoffrey  sauntering  in 
their  wake,  moving  in  and  out  among 
the  tallest  flowers.  That  garden  is 
almost  like  the  visible  rising  of  a 
dream.  It  means  that  the  children 
have  grown  up,  to  meet  us  on  the 
lines  of  our  own  planning.  I  love  the 
185 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

flowers  for  that.  And  yet  sometimes 
I  give  a  swift,  affectionate  thought  to 
that  old-time  scene  —  the  sand-piles, 
the  little  house,  the  snapping  turtle 
pacing  up  and  down  on  guard,  and 
by  the  fence,  the  hardy  flowering  al 
mond  bush,  the  striped  grass,  and 
the  Perennial  Peal 


XIII 
DRIFTWOOD  FIRE 


HAVE  in  my  cellar  a  bar 
rel  of  driftwood,  planks 
of  old  whaling  brigs  with 
the  copper  nails  still  bris 
tling  here  and  there.  Every  winter 
Endicott  orders  me  just  such  a  bar 
rel,  sometimes  from  Montauk,  some 
times  from  New  Bedford,  where  the 
old  schooners  are  broken  up.  This  is 
in  memory  of  one  evening  years  ago 
on  our  wedding  trip  when  the  uncer 
tain  wheels  of  the  Montauk  stage 
drew  up  at  the  door  of  Conklin's-by- 
the-Sea,  and  we  went  in  from  the 
rain.  There,  in  the  farm  kitchen,  we 
187 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

found  our  first  driftwood  fire  burning 
blue  and  lavender  on  the  hearth. 

Ever  since,  our  wood-basket  has  had 
hidden  under  the  logs  of  maple  and 
hickory  a  stick  or  two  of  the  battered 
old  whalers.  This  has  become  a  family 
tradition.  The  children  used  to  make 
witch-fires  of  the  wood  on  Hallowe'en. 
Planks  of  it  went  to  college  on  the 
floors  of  their  trunks.  And  now,  when 
they  are  all  away  and  have  barrels  of 
their  own,  Endicott  invites  guests  for 
the  winter  evening,  and  still  gets  me 
my  driftwood. 

This  is  about  all  Endicott  does  do 
in  the  matter  for  he  does  not  like  to 
chop.  The  planks  are  too  large  for 
economical  burning,  and  really  need 
to  be  split.  This  must,  moreover,  be 
done  with  some  skill,  without  flaking 
188 


DRIFTWOOD  FIRE 

off  the  strange  green  substance  that 
cakes  their  surface,  and  without  wast 
ing  a  single  nail-hole.  I  can  therefore 
have  no  unlettered  man  of  toil  chop 
ping  my  whalers  for  hire.  Therefore, 
since  I  find  the  professional  classes 
loth  to  chop,  I  descend  to  my  bar 
rel,  pry  out  a  plank,  and  split  the 
worn  old  sticks  myself.  With  my  little 
pile  of  odd-shaped  fagots  in  hand,  I 
ascend  to  my  wood-basket,  and  wait 
for  a  good  night  for  a  fire,  with  guests. 
Guests,  we  have  found,  always 
behave  better  at  their  second  drift 
wood  fire  than  at  their  first.  If  drift 
wood  is  mentioned  to  the  human  race, 
the  human  race  invariably  mentions 
driftwood  powder.  At  least,  no  guest 
of  ours,  but  one,  has  ever  failed  to 
discuss  it,  its  ingredients,  and  the 

189 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

shops  where  it  may  be  had.  Endicott 
at  such  times  plays  the  perfect  host. 
He  evinces  cordial  interest,  explain 
ing  in  turn  how  the  copper  nails  and 
copper  sheathing  of  these  ancient 
brigs,  acted  upon  by  the  chemicals 
in  sea-water,  produce  a  similar  com 
pound.  In  fact,  for  some  guests,  En 
dicott  maintains,  the  powder  would 
be  best.  A  tablespoonful  sown  over 
the  fire  —  and  lo!  the  instant,  sure 
result,  continuing  as  long  as  one 
cares  to  keep  on  basting  the  logs 
with  it.  The  powder  has  its  advan 
tage;  at  least  its  possibilities  furnish 
talk  in  the  first  few  minutes  after  the 
true  driftwood  has  been  laid  on  the 
embers. 

As  the  mouldy  old  sticks  kindle 
slowly  with  ordinary  yellow  flame,  I 
190 


DRIFTWOOD  FIRE 

am  always  uneasy.  I  can  feel  the  guest 
deciding  that  the  much-talked-of  col 
ors  are  all  imagination.  I  recall  the 
dreadful  evening  when  driftwood  did 
refuse  to  burn  colors,  —  a  plank  that 
I  myself  had  collected  by  the  shore 
and  brought  home  in  my  steamer 
trunk.  I  was  having  an  experimental 
fire  by  myself  with  a  piece  of  it  one 
evening  when  Endicott  walked  in. 

"Burning  the  ship?"  asked  Endi 
cott  cordially. 

"I  don't  believe  it 's  exactly  a  ship," 
I  explained  modestly.  "It  looked  like 
the  end  of  an  old  dory." 

"It  acts  like  the  end  of  an  old 
shed,"  said  Endicott. 

This  conversation  runs  in  my  head 
whenever  driftwood  burns  yellow. 

And  then,  in  the  midst  of  such 
191 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

uncomfortable  reflections,  up  flare 
the  waves  of  green  and  saffron-green 
and  blue.  Little  points  of  clear  color 
flicker  at  every  crevice,  and  conversa 
tion  dies. 

I  do  not  know  what  we  all  think 
about  as  we  watch  it.  Perhaps  it  is 
not  necessary  to  muse  on  lost  ships 
and  storms  and  broken  ventures,  nor 
on  all  our  drifted  voyages  apart.  It 
is  enough  for  once  to  see  a  rainbow  in 
flames. 

There  is  no  monotony  now.  Rarer 
colors  show  as  the  heart  of  the  wood 
begins  to  burn.  Rich  violet  some- 
tunes  glows  underneath,  and  a  pe 
culiar  lilac  color  wavers  over  the 
burned -out  fragments  as  the  edges 
crumble.  One  stick  falls,  and  a 
glory  of  turquoise  and  peacock-green 
192 


DRIFTWOOD  FIRE 

rushes  up  afresh.  We  watch  it  burn 
and  change  and  flare,  until  at  length 
it  settles  slowly  into  one  last  quiet 
flame  of  softest  blue,  with  now  and 
then  a  tiny  red  spark  running  over 
its  surface,  like  a  wild-goose-chase 
up  a  kobold's  chimney  flue.  Rose- 
color  in  the  embers;  the  last  of  the 
fire  is  the  best.  Then  absolute  dark, 
uncompromising  as  the  death  of  a 
dream. 

"Can  you  reach  that  bit  of  excelsior 
in  the  corner  of  the  basket?"  inquires 
Endicott  of  the  guest.  The  obliging 
friend  gropes  efficiently  in  the  dark. 

"Now  watch,"  remarks  Endicott, 
and  puts  a  handful  of  tinder  on  the 
dark  little  heap  that  was  our  fire. 

What  follows  must  some  day  go 
into  somebody's  collected  poems.  I 

193 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

have  mentioned  our  one  guest  who 
did  not  talk  about  driftwood  powder. 
We  first  tried  the  experiment  when 
he  was  here,  and  I  have  always 
thought  that  he  would  write  the 
poem.  For,  as  we  watched,  up  through 
the  common  tinder  rose  once  more 
the  best  of  all  the  driftwood  colors; 
the  exquisite  purity  of  blue  and 
lilac,  and  the  palest  daffodil  and 
green.  We  tossed  fragments  of  birch 
and  apple  wood  into  the  flame,  and 
they  burned  as  if  they  too  had  sailed 
the  old  North  Sea  with  Sir  Patrick 
Spens.  Up  from  those  soft  dim  ashes, 
into  the  commonplace  material,  came 
the  rarest  spirit  of  flame.  We  asked 
our  guest  what  the  poem  should  be 
about.  He  said  that  it  meant  for  him 
the  sadness  of  second  love.  He  said 

194 


DRIFTWOOD  FIRE 

that  it  might  be  a  symbol  of  sharing 
of  inspiration.  He  said  it  was  the 
beauty  of  a  dead  dream  rising  to 
bless  a  common  life. 

Endicott,  with  academic  eyeglasses 
akimbo,  watched  the  experiment  geni 
ally.  The  poet  dropped  a  twisted  bit 
of  a  business  letter  into  the  ashes, 
and  it  flared  into  a  wave  of  gold  and 
violet. 

"Perhaps  it  is  the  heat  volatilizing 
the  gases  again,"  explained  the  poet 
dreamily. 

"Exactly,"  said  Endicott. 

Yes.  A  quick  little  gust  of  wind 
down  the  chimney  made  the  flame 
whirl  softly.  A  gray  flake  of  feathery 
ash  floated  out  along  the  hearth.  By 
what  winds  had  it  once  been  driven? 
By  what  old  storms  at  night?  I 
195 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

brushed  it  back  into  the  flame  again; 
—  strange  ashes,  curiously  com 
pounded  of  many  things;  of  memories 
of  Arctic  reefs  and  dead  men's  bones, 
and  going  after  whales. 


XIV 

HOW  WILL  YOU  HAVE  YOUR  PAY? 


HEN  I  go  to  have  a  cheque 
cashed  at  the  bank  and 
the  paying-teller  says, 
"How  will  you  have  it  ?" 
I  usually  ask  for  small  bills.  I  do  this 
for  the  convenience  of  the  butter-man, 
the  vegetable-man  and  the  farmer 
who  brings  us  chickens,  but  I  have 
sometimes  thought  that  the  question 
and  answer  at  the  bank  window  are 
symbolic.  "How  will  you  have  your 
pay?" 

Whenever  I  hear  young  mothers 

complain  that  they  simply  have  no 

tune  to  keep  up  with  anything,  I  am 

not  impatient.  I  know  that  it  is  true. 

197 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

The  most  devoted  young  home-maker 
in  the  average  American  family  is 
sometimes  shocked  when  she  finds 
how  large  a  proportion  of  her  time 
must  go  into  little  monotonous  tasks 
of  plain  manual  labor  with  nothing 
to  show  for  it.  I  am  thinking  of  the 
typical  educated  young  woman  who 
glorifies  her  pretty  home,  employs  a 
servant  when  she  can  get  one,  and 
clothes  her  children  in  neat  little 
straight-cut  garments  which  she  has 
learned  may  be  stout  and  plain  but 
never  dirty.  How  glibly  one  can  pro 
nounce  that  last  specification,  and 
how  reasonable  it  sounds.  The  table- 
linen,  also,  may  be  simple  to  the  point 
of  severity  but  at  least  it  must  be 
spotless.  At  least!  That  is  no  light 
proviso  when  one  infant  in  the  family 
198 


HOW  WILL  YOU  HAVE  YOUR  PAY? 

is  learning  to  hold  a  spoon  in  his  un 
certain  fist,  and  when  an  older  child 
is  learning  to  cut  up  meat  and  cope 
with  a  baked  potato.  I  confess  that 
there  were  times  in  our  own  fam 
ily  history  when  if  it  had  not  been 
for  Endicott's  standards,  a  simple 
runner  of  spotless  oilcloth  would 
have  decked  our  dinner-table.  The 
civilized  standards  certainly  do  take 
thought  and  time. 

The  sort  of  young  woman  whom  I 
have  in  mind  wants  to  meet  the 
civilized  standard  and  meet  it  grace 
fully.  She  is  ready  to  sacrifice  outside 
interests  to  her  home  duties.  She  can 
not,  however,  help  feeling  sorry  when 
she  finds  that  many  of  her  cultivated 
talents  are  running  down.  She  had 
intended  to  keep  up  her  music,  for 
199 


ENDIGOTT  AND  I 

example,  but  she  finds  that  her  chil 
dren  instantly  recognize  the  differ 
ence  between  the  music  she  plays  for 
them  and  the  things  that  she  prac 
tices  in  the  line  of  scales  and  etudes. 
Childhood  taste  instinctively  eschews 
the  etude.  Besides,  she  has  not  time 
enough  for  study  without  neglect  of 
the  hundred  details  that  are  waiting 
for  her.  I  myself  did  manage  to  revive 
my  piano  practice  one  winter  by 
allowing  my  small  son  to  sit  on  the 
piano  bench  beside  me  and  accom 
pany  me  on  a  toy  drum.  With  the 
steady  roll  of  his  drum-beats  at  my 
side  we  made  quite  a  martial  sound. 
One  afternoon  I  turned  suddenly 
from  my  exercises  and  began  to  play 
the  "Moonlight  Sonata."  Geoffrey 
paused  with  lifted  drum-sticks  and 
200 


HOW  WILL  YOU  HAVE  YOUR  PAY? 

listened.  Then  he  observed,  "That's 
no  piece  to  drum  to,"  left  me  for  a 
moment,  and  came  clambering  back 
beside  me  again,  singing  through  a 
comb.  The  bust  of  Beethoven  on 
the  music-cabinet  almost  relaxed  its 
frown. 

With  ingenuity  and  planning,  I 
think,  it  is  really  possible  for  a  busy 
housewife  to  cling  to  her  music  and 
share  it  with  her  children.  Even  if  she 
does  get  out  of  practice,  the  remnants 
of  her  damaged  accomplishments 
sometimes  go  as  far  toward  mellowing 
life  as  the  most  finished  concert  per 
formance.  But  the  fact  remains  that 
for  genuine  creative  progress  in  any 
art,  the  presence  of  domestic  care  is 
not  a  stimulus.  No  doubt  it  ought  to 
be;  Endicott  has  a  good  deal  to  say 
201 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

about  "angels  in  the  kitchen."  I 
know  that  the  home-maker  is  en 
gaged  in  the  most  divine  and  ele 
mental  occupation,  and  that  her  soul 
should  put  forth  blossoms  accord 
ingly.  But  the  modern  kitchen  is  a 
place  calculated  to  absorb  the  atten 
tion  and  the  vitality  of  the  most 
feathery  angel  imaginable.  When  it 
comes  to  literary  work  or  indepen 
dent  scholarship  of  any  sort,  the 
efficient  housekeeper  must  follow  the 
example  of  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe 
and  write  upon  the  stove-pipe  if  at 
all. 

It  is  as  well  to  recognize  the  situa 
tion,  not  as  it  ought  to  be,  perhaps, 
but  as  we  find  it.  The  woman  who 
marries  and  makes  a  home  to-day, 
unless  she  wants  to  dodge  the  issue 
202 


HOW  WILL  YOU  HAVE  YOUR  PAY? 

and  shift  her  logical  responsibilities 
to  the  hands  of  servants  or  relatives, 
must  give  up  her  mastery  of  the  pro 
fession  in  which  she  was  launched 
before  marriage,  and  must  learn  half 
a  dozen  new  and  complicated  arts. 
It  is  as  if  a  man,  at  marriage,  were 
expected  to  leave  his  desk  or  his  en 
gineering  or  his  manufacturing  plant, 
and  take  up  the  combined  profes 
sions  of  janitor,  grade-teacher,  tailor, 
trained  nurse,  and  chef,  without 
drawing  the  salary  of  any  one  of 
them.  Feminist  Bolsheviki  of  every 
stripe  have  made  much  of  this  situa 
tion.  It  is  at  the  root  of  modern 
theories  about  community  kitchens, 
about  the  bringing  up  of  children  by 
the  State,  and  about  arrangements 
whereby  the  husband  and  wife  go  on 
203 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

parsuing  independent  professions  ana 
meeting  each  other  congenially  at  a 
restaurant  for  dinner  at  night. 

In  spite  of  this  unrest,  however, 
most  of  us  will  continue  to  find  an 
essential  beauty  in  family  home-life 
closely  knit  and  intimately  shared. 
Most  of  us  believe  that  a  woman  can 
afford  to  give  up  attainments  in  other 
arts  for  the  sake  of  an  intense  and 
creative  study  of  this  central  art  of 
living.  She  must  serve  her  ideal  at  the 
cost  of  many  phases  of  her  other 
potential  talents,  but  so  must  any 
artist.  It  all  depends  on  how  im 
portant  we  think  the  home-associa 
tions  of  the  race  to  be. 

Suppose,  then,  that  a  woman  ac 
cepts  all  the  conditions  squarely, 
sticks  to  her  ideals,  masters  the  de- 
204 


HOW  WILL  YOU  HAVE  YOUR  PAY? 

tails  of  domestic  machinery,  brings 
up  her  children,  and  finally  launches 
them  on  lives  of  their  own.  How  will 
she  take  her  pay? 

She  cannot  often  take  it  in  freedom 
from  anxiety.  One  of  her  acquired 
talents  is  an  acute  feeling  of  responsi 
bility.  All  her  life  long  she  has  slept 
with  one  ear  alert  for  the  slightest 
sound.  She  is  still  wide-awake  and 
vigilant.  And  she  knows  that  in  spite 
of  her  sensitive  skill  in  adjusting  the 
details  of  her  children's  lives  hith 
erto,  she  is  now  powerless  to  govern 
a  single  event  that  may  happen  to 
them. 

Every  mother  thought  of  this  when 
the  war  was  going  on.  What  use  had 
it  been,  this  intricate  work  of  build 
ing  up  and  training  young  life,  if  a 

205 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

single  bomb  in  a  flash  of  time  could 
dash  it  to  pieces  without  a  trace? 
A  destructive  force  accomplishes  so 
much  with  such  finality  in  an  instant. 
A  constructive  force,  in  contrast, 
works  against  odds,  works  with  in 
finite  patience  with  treacherous  ele 
ments  on  every  hand,  works  at 
unlimited  expense.  It  was  sickening 
to  belong  to  the  constructive  forces 
in  war-time.  And  yet  I  have  never 
been  so  fully  convinced  of  the  signifi 
cance  of  ordinary  family  life  as  I 
was  during  the  eighteen  months  when 
Geoffrey  was  in  France.  Suppose  the 
entire  fabric  of  our  physical  existence 
did  go  to  atoms  in  an  instant.  Would 
not  the  structure  of  family  experience 
outlast  even  that?  What  parts  of  our 
companionship  were  durable  in  the 

206 


HOW  WILL  YOU  HAVE  YOUR  PAY? 

face  of  long  separation  and  broken 
plans? 

Not  only  in  war-time,  but  nor 
mally,  every  family  life  is  subject  to 
unforeseen  disaster.  Nine  chances  out 
of  ten,  the  moment  a  careful  mother 
has  steered  her  course  to  the  point 
where  she  might  reasonably  expect 
plain  sailing,  some  unexpected  cyclone 
comes  up  ahead  and  she  has  to  rush 
about  launching  lifeboats  in  all  di 
rections.  Her  reward  seldom  comes 
in  the  form  of  "peace,  perfect  peace." 

How,  then,  does  she  take  her  pay? 
I  think  that  she  usually  takes  it  in 
frequent  installments  of  small  de 
nomination.  She  finds  it  in  the  confi 
dential  remark  of  a  little  child,  in  a 
moment  of  pleasant  companionship 
with  her  husband,  in  a  conference 
207 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

with  a  grown-up  son  or  daughter 
when  thought  flashes  across  with  the 
humorous  illumination  of  old-time  un 
derstanding;  and  most  of  all  in  her 
first-hand  experience  with  the  major 
facts  of  life. 

This  last  is  no  small  thing.  We  see 
the  importance  of  contemporary  liv 
ing  only  in  glimpses,  but  when  we  do 
catch  sight  of  it  clearly  we  never  for 
get.  My  own  most  striking  vision  of 
the  dignity  of  our  modern  type  is  a 
memory  picture  of  my  own  father 
near  the  end  of  his  long  life.  One  of 
his  youngest  grandchildren  was  just 
a  year  old  that  day,  and  her  mother 
had  brought  her  over  so  that  the 
grandfather  might  light  the  candle  on 
her  first  birthday  cake.  There  he  sat 
against  the  shadows  of  the  early 
208 


HOW  WILL  YOU  HAVE  YOUR  PAY? 

winter  evening,  holding  the  delighted 
baby  on  his  knee.  The  clear  flame  of 
the  one  candle  lit  up  the  flushed 
cheeks  and  silky  round  head  of  the 
dark-eyed  little  baby,  and  deepened 
the  splendid  furrows  in  the  face  of 
the  grandfather.  It  was  a  Rem 
brandt  lighting,  but  not  a  Rembrandt 
face.  Rembrandt's  old  men  are  tired; 
their  nobility  is  that  of  weariness  and 
the  sheer  duration  of  time.  But  the 
expression  of  the  grandfather's  face 
in  the  candle-light  was  not  weary;  it 
was  attentive,  whimsical,  powerfully 
expressive  of  the  poetry  of  the  mo 
ment.  I  shall  always  keep  that  picture 
— the  thoughtful  old  man  and  the 
exquisite  little  baby  sitting  together 
to  watch  the  candle  burn. 
Perhaps  it  is  always  in  the  ad- 
209 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

joining  generations  that  we  see  the 
grandeur  of  the  human  type  most 
clearly.  We  are  more  stirred  by  the 
very  young  and  the  very  old  than  by 
people  like  ourselves.  But  we  of  the 
middle  years  can  be  assured  that  the 
mode  of  civilization  which  can  pro 
duce  old  men  of  wisdom  and  vitality, 
and  young  men  of  purpose  and  en 
durance,  is  a  phase  of  human  history 
that  is  worthy  of  our  steel.  No  matter 
what  earthquake  comes,  we  have 
known  life.  Nothing  to  show  for  it  if 
the  physical  part  of  it  goes  to  pieces? 
But  we  have  had  the  honor  and  glory 
of  touching  it  with  a  reverent  hand. 

Years  ago,  when  I  dropped  into 
Endicott's  office  one  afternoon,  I  saw 
a  large  glass  paper-weight  on  a  pile 
210 


HOW  WILL  YOU  HAVE  YOUR  PAY? 

of  letters  on  his  desk.  The  paper 
weight,  I  knew,  was  a  relic  of  his 
bachelor  days,  and  I  picked  it  up 
with  interest.  It  was  the  sort  of 
contrivance  made  so  that  pictures 
and  memoranda  of  all  kinds  could  be 
inserted  under  the  glass.  I  found  that 
Endicott  had  stolen  a  photograph  of 
mine  and  had  put  it  in  among  the 
miscellaneous  clippings  and  souvenirs 
that  the  generous  frame  contained. 
Directly  under  my  picture  I  read  this 
clipping  from  Longfellow's  "Hyper 
ion":  "Look  not  mournfully  into  the 
Past.  It  comes  not  back  again.  Wisely 
improve  the  Present.  It  is  thine.  Go 
forth  to  meet  the  shadowy  Future, 
without  fear,  and  with  a  manly  heart." 
"Endicott,"  I  began  gently  (this  was 
in  the  early  days  when  I  still  avoided  the 
211 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

role  of  termagant  wife)  — "  Endicott,  do 
you  consider  the  inscription  beneath 
my  picture  exactly  appropriate?" 

"What  inscription?"  asked  Endicott, 
looking  up  from  his  desk.  I  handed 
him  the  paper-weight  in  silence. 

"That?"  said  Endicott.  "That  does 
n't  go  with  the  picture.  I  put  it 
in  there  years  before  I  ever  saw  you." 

But  I  was  afraid  that  Endicott's 
business  friends  might  misinterpret 
the  tone  of  courageous  resignation  in 
the  motto.  I  stole  the  paper-weight. 

A  while  ago  I  came  across  it  where 
I  had  hidden  it  in  the  corner  of  a  big 
chest  in  the  attic.  The  photograph 
was  faded  and  the  quotation  from 
"  Hyperion"  was  turning  yellow  around 
the  edges.  After  all,  I  thought,  that 
motto  might  be  worse.  I  took  it 
212 


HOW  WILL  YOU  HAVE  YOUR  PAY? 

downstairs    and    made    Endicott    a 
resent  of  it  for  his  study-table. 

That  evening  we  sat  and  talked 
ntil  late,  about  our  home,  and  the 
far,  and  about  how  things  would 
)ok  to  Geoffrey  when  he  came  back 
rom  France.  We  compared  notes 
bout  the  things  he  mentioned  most 
'equently  when  he  wrote  of  coming 
ome:  the  Sunday  morning  break- 
ist,  the  fireplace,  strawberry  short- 
ake,  the  family  conclave  on  the 
-ont  stairs  on  the  way  to  bed,  our 
aturday  night  peanuts,  and  —  most 
jnder  association  of  all — the  family 
rater-pitcher.  I  told  Endicott  that  I 
lought  that  one  of  the  rewards  of 

mother's  life  was  the  pleasure  of 
eing  associated  with  all  these  homely 
3ntral  things. 

213 


ENDICOTT  AND  I 

Endicott  listened  with  interest  and 
said,  "That 's  true  about  the  mother's 
part  in  the  family  life,  but  where  does 
the  father  come  in?" 

Then  I  assured  Endicott  that  he 
could  not  possibly  come  in  —  for  he  is 
in  already,  in  the  very  center  of  the 
family  group,  the  charter  member  and 
founder  of  it  all. 


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